Suspend Your Disbelief

Posts Tagged ‘columns’

Essays |

Bishop and Lowell Read Everything

From the Archives: What does our reading have to do with our writing, exactly? Charlotte Boulay departs from traditional talk about fiction, reflects on her own reading list, and finds comfort and enthusiasm in reading Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell’s letters to each other, in which they discuss everything they read—and the fact that they read all the time.


Essays |

[POETRY FOR PROSERS] "We have poets? Do they wear capes?": A sort-of review of David Orr’s Beautiful and Pointless (and some meditations on poets and poetry)

Why did I feel such hope when I first heard about David Orr’s new book, Beautiful and Pointless: A Guide to Modern Poetry? I’ve read my share of poetry guides, and most of them have taken up residence in a particularly dusty neighborhood on my poetry bookshelf. But Orr’s book had a title that pretty much summed up my own weary but hopeful sentiments about contemporary poetry.