WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.700 align:middle line:90% Thank you very much. 00:00:02.700 --> 00:00:04.920 align:middle line:84% I think the climate here must be very dry. 00:00:04.920 --> 00:00:06.510 align:middle line:90% My mouth seems to be sticking. 00:00:06.510 --> 00:00:08.980 align:middle line:90% And I don't drink anymore. 00:00:08.980 --> 00:00:12.360 align:middle line:84% It used to be vodka and tonic would do that, 00:00:12.360 --> 00:00:13.530 align:middle line:90% but I don't drink anymore. 00:00:13.530 --> 00:00:15.270 align:middle line:90% So I have no excuse. 00:00:15.270 --> 00:00:18.480 align:middle line:90% [MOUTH NOISES] 00:00:18.480 --> 00:00:21.270 align:middle line:84% I started teaching at the age of 40. 00:00:21.270 --> 00:00:24.300 align:middle line:84% And before that, I worked in an aircraft factory 00:00:24.300 --> 00:00:27.460 align:middle line:90% for about 13 years. 00:00:27.460 --> 00:00:33.510 align:middle line:84% There's some rivalries sometimes set up, 00:00:33.510 --> 00:00:37.410 align:middle line:84% I think, needlessly, between creative writers and more 00:00:37.410 --> 00:00:40.620 align:middle line:90% traditional academic people. 00:00:40.620 --> 00:00:46.170 align:middle line:84% I think these games are noisy and needless, in a way. 00:00:46.170 --> 00:00:48.270 align:middle line:90% I think usually, too, and-- 00:00:48.270 --> 00:00:51.210 align:middle line:84% when some creative writer is criticizing 00:00:51.210 --> 00:00:53.220 align:middle line:84% the typical academic, he's really 00:00:53.220 --> 00:00:55.710 align:middle line:84% usually talking about the worst of the academics. 00:00:55.710 --> 00:00:59.250 align:middle line:84% And I think the same goes when the academics are criticizing 00:00:59.250 --> 00:01:00.480 align:middle line:90% the creative writers. 00:01:00.480 --> 00:01:04.080 align:middle line:84% They're talking about the most vain and egotistical 00:01:04.080 --> 00:01:05.220 align:middle line:90% of the creative writers. 00:01:05.220 --> 00:01:08.670 align:middle line:84% But I've had an opportunity to work with some very fine 00:01:08.670 --> 00:01:10.530 align:middle line:90% academics and to know some. 00:01:10.530 --> 00:01:12.990 align:middle line:84% In fact, I'm proud to say I number, 00:01:12.990 --> 00:01:15.390 align:middle line:84% among my friends, J. Hillis Miller, who I think 00:01:15.390 --> 00:01:17.340 align:middle line:90% is a great literary critic. 00:01:17.340 --> 00:01:21.250 align:middle line:84% And by "great" I mean I can understand his criticism. 00:01:21.250 --> 00:01:21.750 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:01:21.750 --> 00:01:24.150 align:middle line:90% And it helps me to understand. 00:01:24.150 --> 00:01:27.780 align:middle line:90% I mean, I find some critics-- 00:01:27.780 --> 00:01:29.910 align:middle line:84% Northrop Frye's essay on Stevens, 00:01:29.910 --> 00:01:32.640 align:middle line:84% for example, I find absolutely unintelligible. 00:01:32.640 --> 00:01:35.460 align:middle line:90% But Miller seems to make sense. 00:01:35.460 --> 00:01:39.720 align:middle line:84% I mean, let's say, I understand the literature better. 00:01:39.720 --> 00:01:44.880 align:middle line:84% Well, I've done a poem that's not dedicated 00:01:44.880 --> 00:01:45.960 align:middle line:90% to anybody in particular. 00:01:45.960 --> 00:01:49.050 align:middle line:84% But it's for all those people who 00:01:49.050 --> 00:01:51.900 align:middle line:84% do teach very difficult subjects that I couldn't possibly 00:01:51.900 --> 00:01:55.170 align:middle line:84% teach, like modern literary criticism, 00:01:55.170 --> 00:01:59.760 align:middle line:84% and who can understand people like RP Blackmer and so forth. 00:01:59.760 --> 00:02:02.800 align:middle line:90% And I've written this poem. 00:02:02.800 --> 00:02:04.560 align:middle line:90% It's called The Art of Poetry. 00:02:04.560 --> 00:02:07.410 align:middle line:90% 00:02:07.410 --> 00:02:12.780 align:middle line:84% "The man in the moon was better not a man. 00:02:12.780 --> 00:02:17.640 align:middle line:84% Think sad Raymond, how you glare across the sea, 00:02:17.640 --> 00:02:23.370 align:middle line:84% hating the invisible Near East and your wife's hysteria. 00:02:23.370 --> 00:02:27.150 align:middle line:84% You'll always be here, rain or gloom, 00:02:27.150 --> 00:02:29.670 align:middle line:90% painting a private Syria. 00:02:29.670 --> 00:02:33.900 align:middle line:84% Preferred dimensions of girls, outside 00:02:33.900 --> 00:02:37.170 align:middle line:90% gulls scar across your fantasy. 00:02:37.170 --> 00:02:41.430 align:middle line:84% The rifle spray on glass unfocuses the goats 00:02:41.430 --> 00:02:46.680 align:middle line:84% you stalk on the horizon, flattering blue like dolphins 00:02:46.680 --> 00:02:49.380 align:middle line:90% looping over the sun. 00:02:49.380 --> 00:02:55.170 align:middle line:84% Better the moon you need, better not a man, sad Raymond 00:02:55.170 --> 00:02:56.760 align:middle line:90% twice a day. 00:02:56.760 --> 00:02:58.335 align:middle line:90% The tide comes in. 00:02:58.335 --> 00:03:01.170 align:middle line:90% 00:03:01.170 --> 00:03:05.430 align:middle line:84% Envy your homemade heroes when the tide is low, 00:03:05.430 --> 00:03:10.530 align:middle line:84% laughing their spades at clams, drinking a breezy beer 00:03:10.530 --> 00:03:12.930 align:middle line:90% and breeze from Asia Minor. 00:03:12.930 --> 00:03:18.270 align:middle line:84% In those far far, principalities they've been, their tall wives 00:03:18.270 --> 00:03:20.910 align:middle line:90% elegant in audience with kings. 00:03:20.910 --> 00:03:25.050 align:middle line:84% And envy that despairing man you found one morning 00:03:25.050 --> 00:03:30.390 align:middle line:84% sobbing on a log, babbling about a stuffed heart in Wyoming. 00:03:30.390 --> 00:03:33.330 align:middle line:84% Don't think Raymond they'd respond 00:03:33.330 --> 00:03:38.190 align:middle line:84% to what's inside you every minute, crawling slowest tide. 00:03:38.190 --> 00:03:40.110 align:middle line:90% Better not tell them. 00:03:40.110 --> 00:03:46.770 align:middle line:84% Better the man you seem, sad Raymond twice a night. 00:03:46.770 --> 00:03:50.400 align:middle line:90% The tide comes in. 00:03:50.400 --> 00:03:53.430 align:middle line:84% Think once how good you dreamed, the way 00:03:53.430 --> 00:03:57.930 align:middle line:84% you hummed a melody from Norway when that summer storm came 00:03:57.930 --> 00:04:02.520 align:middle line:84% battering the alders, turning the silver underside of leaves 00:04:02.520 --> 00:04:03.960 align:middle line:90% toward the moon. 00:04:03.960 --> 00:04:08.280 align:middle line:84% And think sad Raymond of the wrong way maturation 00:04:08.280 --> 00:04:12.450 align:middle line:84% came, wanting only those women you despised, 00:04:12.450 --> 00:04:16.200 align:middle line:84% imitating the voice of every man you envied. 00:04:16.200 --> 00:04:22.230 align:middle line:84% The slow walk home alone, pause at door, the screaming kitchen, 00:04:22.230 --> 00:04:26.910 align:middle line:84% and every day this window, loathing the real horizon. 00:04:26.910 --> 00:04:29.640 align:middle line:84% That's what you are, better the man 00:04:29.640 --> 00:04:33.840 align:middle line:84% you are, a sad Raymond twice a day. 00:04:33.840 --> 00:04:36.870 align:middle line:90% The tide comes in. 00:04:36.870 --> 00:04:41.580 align:middle line:84% All's in the name, what if you were Fred, then none of this 00:04:41.580 --> 00:04:42.810 align:middle line:90% need happen. 00:04:42.810 --> 00:04:45.750 align:middle line:84% What's sad Raymond if in your will, 00:04:45.750 --> 00:04:50.670 align:middle line:84% you leave your tongue and tear ducts to a transplant hospital. 00:04:50.670 --> 00:04:53.070 align:middle line:84% There's your motive for trailing goats 00:04:53.070 --> 00:04:56.520 align:middle line:84% to Barnhill, goats that suddenly are real, 00:04:56.520 --> 00:05:00.010 align:middle line:84% out distancing the quick shark and the quarter mile 00:05:00.010 --> 00:05:02.260 align:middle line:90% and singing home sweet home. 00:05:02.260 --> 00:05:04.360 align:middle line:90% Motive, but no blood. 00:05:04.360 --> 00:05:10.510 align:middle line:84% Sad, sad, the salty fusillade of skewers once more your raging 00:05:10.510 --> 00:05:11.650 align:middle line:90% playfield. 00:05:11.650 --> 00:05:13.930 align:middle line:90% Better behind the glass. 00:05:13.930 --> 00:05:16.060 align:middle line:90% Better the man you were. 00:05:16.060 --> 00:05:18.790 align:middle line:90% A sad Raymond twice a night. 00:05:18.790 --> 00:05:21.460 align:middle line:90% The tide comes in. 00:05:21.460 --> 00:05:27.850 align:middle line:84% A sad Raymond twice a lifetime, the tyrant moon loses control. 00:05:27.850 --> 00:05:31.360 align:middle line:84% Tides are run by starfish, and those charts 00:05:31.360 --> 00:05:36.360 align:middle line:84% you study mornings on your wall are meaningless as tide. 00:05:36.360 --> 00:05:39.400 align:middle line:84% The Near East isn't near or East. 00:05:39.400 --> 00:05:44.410 align:middle line:84% And Fred was an infant in your neighborhood devoured by a dog. 00:05:44.410 --> 00:05:48.880 align:middle line:84% Those days you walk the beach looking for that man who's 00:05:48.880 --> 00:05:50.740 align:middle line:90% pure in his despair. 00:05:50.740 --> 00:05:52.570 align:middle line:90% He's never there. 00:05:52.570 --> 00:05:56.770 align:middle line:84% A real man walks the moon and you can't see him. 00:05:56.770 --> 00:05:59.080 align:middle line:90% The moon is cavalier. 00:05:59.080 --> 00:06:04.090 align:middle line:84% Better to search your sadness for the man, a sad Raymond. 00:06:04.090 --> 00:06:06.610 align:middle line:90% Twice a moment tides come in." 00:06:06.610 --> 00:06:09.430 align:middle line:90% 00:06:09.430 --> 00:06:15.760 align:middle line:84% Listen I have been up here a goodly time. 00:06:15.760 --> 00:06:19.540 align:middle line:90% 00:06:19.540 --> 00:06:22.780 align:middle line:84% As I say, is this is my first time in Arizona in 32 years. 00:06:22.780 --> 00:06:25.600 align:middle line:84% And I never expected an audience this big 00:06:25.600 --> 00:06:29.530 align:middle line:84% and you've been very gracious and very attentive. 00:06:29.530 --> 00:06:32.440 align:middle line:84% And that's why being up here this last hour 00:06:32.440 --> 00:06:33.860 align:middle line:90% has really been my pleasure. 00:06:33.860 --> 00:06:35.757 align:middle line:90% So my thanks to you. 00:06:35.757 --> 00:06:38.739 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE] 00:06:38.739 --> 00:06:58.140 align:middle line:90% 00:06:58.140 --> 00:06:59.380 align:middle line:90% Thank you very much. 00:06:59.380 --> 00:07:01.250 align:middle line:90% You're very sweet.