Mary Harwell Sayler Reviews NATURAL THEOLOGIES by Denise Low for RATTLE

This is the beginning of a review in RATTLE, by Mary Harwell Sayler.  Quoted from the review:
"....I got to know the diverse [Midwestern] voices in this 'first critical study of contemporary Mid-Plains literature'—a book that includes much-admired poets and writers but also a wide range of Midwestern voices I had not previously heard. Denise Low obviously knows each of those voices well. Not only has she taught at various universities and won prestigious awards for her own books, she’s a fifth-generation Kansan, whose roots go as deep as prairie grasslands. More importantly, perhaps, her personal lineage of European and tribal peoples have given her a uniquely blended background for intelligently discussing relevant topics—from the landscape to the Lakota to the contemporary literary achievements of native Midwesterners."

This reviewer understands important threads of this project. Sayler continues:

"Taking cover under the book’s title, four sections come together in 'A Revised Frontier Literature' (with a variety of accomplished poets and writers, including Denise Low), 'Settlement. The Cities' (with Langston Hughes, David Ray, Mbembe Milton Smith, Stanley E. Banks), 'Hard Land, Strong Character' (William Stafford, Robert Day, Patricia Traxler, and others), and 'Natural Theologies,' which looks at 'Ted Kooser’s Poetics of Devotion,' the 'Poets in the Bible Belt' (Michael Poage, Jo Mcdougall, and Kathryn Kysar), and 'Louise Erdrich’s Magic Spells, Prayers, and Parables.' That fourth section drew me to the book, but touched on more than I’d imagined, such as how 'American Indian religions derive belief from specific sacred sites,' or how poems by Ted Kooser 'begin located in solid reality, but then surreal leaps occur. . . .'”

 

To continue reading, see http://www.rattle.com/poetry/2013/08/natural-theologies-by-denise-low/   
For more information about the reviewer, see   www.marysayler.com
To obtain a copy, see Amazon or Barnes & Noble or order from The Backwaters Press www.thebackwaterspress.com 
And thanks to the fine journal Rattle at www.rattle.com

Ted Kooser Writes about Magic and Anecdotes

I blogged recently about Ted Kooser and his criticism about poetry that is anecdotal without further layering of intensities. http://deniselow.blogspot.com/2012/05/ted-koose-admonishes-against-anecdotes.html

Here is a bit more from Kooser about this issue in his American Life in Poetry selection this week. http://www.americanlifeinpoetry.org/current.html

So here is the crux: Do you believe in magic? This poem about a fish, literally yes but also something intagibly more.

Ted Kooser Admonishes Against Anecdotes in Road Trip

Road Trip: Conversations with Writers, edited by Shelly Clark and Marjorie Salser, is a an collection of interviews with distinguished Nebraska writers, including Ted Kooser. The book is worth reading for insights into writing well. Especially, this comment by Ted Kooser sticks with me:

One of the things that troubles me concerns anecdotes. We have always had anecdotes as part of our social intercourse, and it seems to me that the only refuge for the anecdote in literature has come to be the poem. I mean, you can use anecdotes in fiction but they are just an incremental part of it. The only place that an anecdote is legitimate is as a poem today, and as a result we have tens of thousands of poems that are merely anecdotes.

 I go to probably 50 poetry readings a year, and I can attest to the fact that many poems are simply personal stories—about scraping ice in winter, watching birds, overhearing conversations, road trip sights, confrontation with the neighbor’s dog or cat—that do not go beyond the moment with heightened language or other tugs on the strings of poetry’s lyre. Kooser goes on: “Simply to take an anecdote of how you helped your mother wash the car and to cut it up in lines and put it on a page is not enough for anybody” (229). Kooser articulates for me the new kind of poetry cliché. The poem's topic itself becomes a cliche, just a like a commonly used phrase--"Flatter than a pancake." This kind of poem begins implicitly, “Isn’t it interesting how I noticed __________?” This can be ended with a clincher, like a joke. Like a joke, it does not translate well to the page. Try reading a joke book, and then watch John Stewart suppress giggles as he delivers a line. Performance adds the sparkle to the words. A good lyric poem is rich and can be read and reread, with new light reflecting when seen from different angles (of time).

 I appreciate Kooser’s comments on two-dimensional storytelling. I apologize to the world for all the poems of this ilk I have written myself (about scraping ice in winter, birds, cats, etc.). I pledge to do better.

 I highly recommend this terrific book of good sense and wit, Road Trip, available online and through indie The Backwaters Press, publisher Greg Kosmicki (www.thebackwaterspress.org ). Other authors in the book are: Jonis Agee, William Kloefkorn, Don Welch, Hilda Raz, Charles Fort, Barbara Schmitz, Ron Block, Eamonn Wall, Twyla Hansen, J.V. Brummels, and Brent Spencer. Each interview includes a picture of the author and representative selections from their work.

American Life in Poetry: "Two Gates," by Denise Low

Ted Kooser, the Poetry Foundation, and the Library of Congress sponsor this weekly poetry column, and a pdf version is available for download at this site. Thanks to Ted Kooser for the thoughtful introductory comment.

http://www.americanlifeinpoetry.org/columns/350.html

Ted Kooser Comments on Kloefkorn's Alvin Turner Book

I first knew of Ted Kooser, former U.S. poet laureate, as an editor of Midwestern poetry books in the 1970s. He labored at this task for years with his Windflower Press, and in the process, he energized many poets, including Nebraska's state poet Bill Kloefkorn (born and raised in Kansas). I came to know Kooser's fine, mysterious poetry soon after he visited the University of Kansas for a reading in about 1978. This first book by Kloefkorn went into numerous printings, and it was a legendary small press bestseller of the day.

Below, we have been discussing the publication history of Kloefkorn's breakthrough book, and here is some clarification from Kooser in a recent email, reprinted with permission:

"If the date on the Windflower edition of Alvin Turner is 1974, that's when I did the first printing. I wouldn't have changed the original year when I did subsequent printings. Unfortunately, all my papers about Windflower have been sent to the university library, which will eventually have all my things on deposit. I think that the Roadapple edition had been out of print and unavailable for quite a while when Bill asked me, or I proposed, to take it on. But this is a long time ago and my memory is fuzzy.
"Best, Ted"

WILLIAM C. KLOEFKORN 1932 -

In 1972, Windflower Press published William Kloefkorn’s first book Alvin Turner as Farmer, which became a regional best seller. The publisher, Ted Kooser, later became U.S. Poet Laureate, and Kloefkorn became lifetime poet laureate for Nebraska in 1982.

Kloefkorn’s verse, written in vernacular language, celebrates Great Plains life. He is one of the first writers, along with Kooser and others, to define a Midwestern voice. Born, raised, and educated in Kansas, he often writes about rural life with understated wit.Kloefkorn is especially a storyteller.

In this poem about Kansas character Carry Nation, he tells history from a young person’s point of view. Contrasts invigorate the story: the “full-fleshed” photograph breaks the wallpaper pattern. Mrs. Wilma Hunt sermonizes about morality as she destroys life. The devil appears, but then is set aside for Kool-Aid. The poet’s dead-pan delivery suggests a third presence: the open-eared listener who observes details, judges a tad, and chuckles at the absurd human condition—like an adult reader.

LTL

Carry A. Nation came into our house and filled it
With her meagerness. She was hung full-fleshed
Against the flowered wallpaper of our living-room,
And Mrs. Wilma Hunt, who brought her, gave each
Of us a little wooden hatchet. “John Barleycorn
Is the Devil,” Mrs. Wilma Hunt said. And
by dropping worms head-
First into alcohol she taught us
To hate him. “Now let me tell
You,” she said, “about the LTL….”

She taught us the Loyal
Temperance Legion song, all of it, then killed
Another worm and served refreshments. Our house
Had never been so full. There were all of us, with
Carry on the wall-
Paper: Kool-Aid, Cookies, Song,
Something-New-to-Hate
And several dead worms
Curled in alcohol.

Education: William Kloefkorn, was born in Attica, Kansas. He received a BA 1954 in English from Emporia State University and then served in the U.S. Marines. In 1956 he taught high school in Ellinwood, then returned to ESU for the MA (1958).
Career: Nebraska named Kloefkorn the State Poet, the equivalent of state poet laureate. He taught at Wichita State from 1958-1962 and Nebraska Wesleyan University from 1962 to 1997. He is active as a writer and performer of poetry. His books—over two dozen—include poetry, fiction, memoir, fiction, and children’s literature.
______________________________________________________________________________
© 2007 Denise Low, AAPP8. © 1974 William C. Kloefkorn, “LTL.” © 2002 Nathan Lambrecht, photograph.
A downloadable version is available for non-commercial use from www.kansaspoets.com