Issue 26 / 2005
26 / The Poets and Writers Issue
Crossing boundaries in genre and life
This issue features many writers whose work crosses the borders between literary genres: from poetry and fiction to creative nonfiction, and illustrates how the lines of division between writers may be disintegrating. The stories themselves also flirt with the idea of crossing boundaries—between life and death, between countries and cultures and languages, and between individuals.
Hilary Masters pores through his writing notebooks and constructs a chimera out of fragments of writing he finds there. Ira Berkow, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist for the New York Times, ventures into memoir to look back at several intersections between his life and that of his legally “incompetent” cousin Marvin. In “Beginning Dialogues,” poet and memoirist Toi Derricotte discovers that her mother’s death has not ended their relationship; rather, in many ways her heart is only just coming to life. Alle C. Hall’s “The Brass Ring” looks at the line between independence and marriage; Robert Wilder records his daughter’s entry into the world; and Mark O’Connor discusses how naming creates belonging. Finally, Kathleen Tarr’s essay, “We Are All Poets Here,” is all about Russian poets generally and Boris Pasternak specifically.
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FROM THE EDITOR: The Poets & Writers Issue
We recently published a story in our monthly e-mail newsletter prompted by a note we received from Brenda Miller, a writer whose nonfiction work has received three Pushcart Prizes and has been published in prestigious literary journals (including this one) and several anthologies.Chimera
A poet friend has sent me a collection of lines that were either cut from his poems in composition or never made it into a finished stanza. He has assembled these lines on a page—all gleaned from different mornings’ work and stirred by separate impulses—into a common cluster.Beginning Dialogues
On the way, he said, “When you visit the cemetery, you do it for yourself. They don’t know you’re there.” But maybe some part of me believes she will know, that she’s brought many good things to me after her death, that she’s taking care.Crying in America
We’re sorry; we’re currently unable to make this work available online.Who Holds the Clicker?
Mario Delia Grotta is 35 years old, with a shaved head and a tattoo of a rose on his pumped left shoulder. He wears gold rings on three of his beefy fingers and a gold chain around his neck.The Brass Ring
A bride-who-never-expected-to-be contends with centuries of cultural tradition and expectationsL’Achat
The 500-franc note wouldn’t fit into the battered, metal box. I could stuff it almost all the way through the slot, but it wouldn’t drop. Visitors to the Eglise St-Sulpice filed by, and as I wrestled with the stubborn clump of paper, I felt the look of suspicion in what I imagined as their frugal French eyes.Looking at Aaron
Midnight, and Aaron is sitting behind the wheel of our rented car. “So what’s this book we’re writing?” he asks. His voice is uninflected. We’re both exhausted from the day’s heat.On Nicknaming
My nephew Aeden, a pale, tow-headed, bilingual 5-year-old, is a piglet, but as he spent the first years of his life in Honduras, he is also un chancho and, along with his sister Keeley, part of los chanchitos.Marvin Escapes Again
On a summer night many years ago, when I was 8 or 9, Cousin Marvin escaped from Great Lakes Veterans Hospital and found his way to his mother’s house on the west side of Chicago, some 35 miles south of where, essentially, he was incarcerated.We Are All Poets Here
There’s a Moscow inside of me. Perhaps it’s existed for a long time, but I didn’t know it. In my subconscious, a balalaika plays. I hear the language and remember my grandparents’ names: Witkowski, Vachie and Dobrovsky.Interview with Hilda Raz
An interview with Hilda Raz, writer of "Looking at Aaron"Interview with Laurie Graham
An interview with Laurie Graham, writer of "L'Achat"Interview with Alle C. Hall
An interview with Alle C. Hall, writer of "The Brass Ring"