Landis Everson, a 79 year-old American poet was named the first recipient of the Poetry Foundation's award for poets over 50 years of age who have never had a book published. I was not aware of either the award or Mr. Everson before reading the story in today's New York Times. The story also mentions a group called the Berkeley Renaissance writers: Robert Duncan, Jack Spicer, Robin Blaser, with which I'm also not familiar. Anybody know of any of these folks?

Here is a link to the article.


[www.nytimes.com]

They are mentioned here. [en.wikipedia.org]

I'm not familiar with their work, though.


Les

Robert Duncan has
"A poem begining with a line by Pindar" in Contemporary American Poetry, Penguin, 1962, Donald Hall (ed)
"Often I am permitted to return to a meadow" and "Poetry, a natural thing" in The Penguin book of American verse, 1983, Geoffrey Moore (ed)

They were all members of the San Francisco Renaissance, the phase of writing here that just barely preceded the Beat ovement and which nourished many of the Beat poets when they first arrived on the scene. Duncan also taught at Black Mountain with Olson and Creeley.
I haven't read Mr. Everson.

Among their books are:

Duncan-- The Opening of the Field
Roots and Branches
Ground Work

Spicer-- The Collected Books of Jack Spicer (Edited by Robin Blaser)

All three of these poets appear in THE NEW AMERICAN POETRY edited by Donald M. Allen, a collection that was a touchstone for American poetry and poetic after 1960.

Les, Linda, and Peter:

Thanks for the references. I'm always looking for something new to read.

JoeT