What would happen if you reimagined all of your favorite pop songs as sonnets? If you’re thinking about that now, just stop: it’s already been done. We’re late to the party: Pop Sonnets: Shakespearean Spins on Your Favorite Songs (Quirk… Continue Reading
Steph Burt (who also goes by Stephen and Stephanie) and Carmen Giménez Smith have been added to the masthead of The Nation as poetry editors. From The Nation: In their new roles, Burt and Giménez Smith will solicit and… Continue Reading
When The Best American Poetry 2015 (Scribner), edited by Sherman Alexie, was published earlier this week, it included a poem from “Yi-Fen Chou.” It turns out that Chou is the pen name of a very-not-Asian writer called Michael Derrick Hudson.… Continue Reading
The Poetry Foundation names a Young People’s Poet Laureate every two years. In 2015, the $25,000 laureate title has been awarded to Jacqueline Woodson. “Jacqueline Woodson is an elegant, daring, and restlessly innovative,” says Poetry Foundation president Robert Polito.“So many… Continue Reading
Alice Notley has been awarded the 2015 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. Established in 1986, the prize recognizes the outstanding lifetime achievement of a living U.S. poet. At $100,000, it is also one of the nation’s largest literary prizes. The Ruth Lilly… Continue Reading
Though poetry often seems undervalued, it seems fitting that poetry month should be highlighted by a sale that sets record-breaking prices for some rare examples of work by well-known authors. The sale was held in three parts by Bonhams in… Continue Reading
A rare handwritten poem by a 13-year-old Charlotte Brontë will go on sale at Bonhams in London tomorrow. The catalog description of Lot 62 reads as follows: BRONTË, CHARLOTTE (1816-1855)AUTOGRAPH MANUSCRIPT POEM WRITTEN IN HER MINUSCULE HAND SIGNED ‘C. BRONTE’, dated… Continue Reading
Nobel Prize-winning author Derek Walcott is mad as hell, and he’s not going to take it anymore. According to Caribbean Book Blog: If there’s one thing that pisses off Derek Walcott, it’s the Caribbean governments’ blatant disregard for the development… Continue Reading
In addition to today being the birthday of the very Dewey who organized the library and the anniversary of the day in 1884 when Mark Twain first published The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Writer’s Almanac lets us know that it… Continue Reading
Looking over our shoulders, it’s easy to underestimate the poetic art of Jack Kerouac. We remember little beyond On the Road, one of the defining works of the Beat Generation. The book celebrated a life of drugs and jazz on… Continue Reading