WEBVTT

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Dean has agreed to
do a 15 minute Q&A

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if you are interested.

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Are you interested?

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[WHISTLE AND CLAP]

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If anybody needs to
leave, you can do it now.

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And then he'll come back up.

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And then after, books are
for sale in the lobby.

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And he will be out there
to sign after the reading.

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Otherwise, we could just
start calling out [INAUDIBLE]..

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[LAUGHTER]

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Hi.

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What are the two places where
you teach, and how is that?

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I'm teaching the Warren
Wilson Low Residency Program,

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and I teach at Iowa.

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[LAUGHTER]

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One is in North
Carolina, one is in--

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where's Iowa?

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Somewhere in the Midwest.

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Seems that with the
students at Iowa

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are generally sort of very
gosh, highly professionalized

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kind of people and
very strong writers.

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We get about must have been
around 460 applications

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for 22 slots.

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Warren Wilson, there
in general students

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we have are quite a bit
older, or they generally

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have lives and jobs.

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So it's a very, very
different student body.

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My colleagues are
very different too.

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Part of it is that I have roles
in each place that I occupy.

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My role with Iowa has often
done with a student staff.

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Telling them [INAUDIBLE]
go into this stuff

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about debased nature
of [INAUDIBLE]

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in a crisis of referentiality.

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[LAUGHTER]

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I scratch my head,
and, do you ever

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get a desire to write about
something that you feel?

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[LAUGHTER]

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[CHEERING]

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[INAUDIBLE] didn't
work for Warren Wilson.

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I say things like,
[INAUDIBLE] fascism.

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And, just to stir stuff up.

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One of the wonderful
things about art

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is that it tolerates
contradiction.

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All that finally matters in
a work of art is its success.

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And its success is related
with where the person is making

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the art, I think, to be
committed to something-- to be

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committed to some sort of idea,
or some sort of procedure,

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or some sort of
relationship with the world,

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be it in terms
materials of the art,

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if the wield of the
materials of the art

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are making so secondary to.

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And when we abstract
those things, when

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you look at those
things generally,

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they're often contradictory.

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But it doesn't matter.

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Because if the
art is successful,

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the art is successful--

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I don't believe you
do have to choose.

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I don't think that you have
to choose between premier

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and [INAUDIBLE] places.

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I believe that you have to
choose between [INAUDIBLE]..

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Because I'm [INAUDIBLE] paid.

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Theology [INAUDIBLE]
was really beautiful.

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Thanks.

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And spoke to one mentor.

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I'm really curious about
who your mentors were?

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If you want to talk a
little more about Koch

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and your relationship.

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And maybe also who you come back
to and read most frequently.

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I want to--

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I was in the first class that
graduated in the MFA program

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in Vienna.

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And I didn't have any
famous poets for teachers.

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And nor did I particularly--

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I have some dear friends who
I'm still very close with.

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But I didn't have any
aesthetic agreements.

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In other words, I
didn't really have--

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I mean, I had to do
an argument, which

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is more important
than having people who

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you can agree with, I think.

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So for me, the first
poets who really

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seem to be writing
what I wanted to write

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were the New York school.

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And the way I got to
[INAUDIBLE] is from my friend

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the poet Mark Halliday.

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I knew him and had
to get to know him.

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And that infuriated me.

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I was very jealous.

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So he told me to write Kenneth.

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And I wrote Kenneth a two-page
letter in single leaf.

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And he wrote me
back a post-card.

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Which was-- that's the
right economy, actually.

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[LAUGHTER]

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I was so pleased by that.

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And that led to me getting
to see him more and more.

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He proved to me-- which was
incredibly important to me.

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And so that's how I met him.

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I got to meet Robert
Hass, who's sort of my--

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they're my kind of right and
left in terms of my writing.

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I feel his work I just think
is a genius, a different kind

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of genius than [INAUDIBLE].

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I got to know him differently.

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But he's a friend now too.

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And I think of them as--

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I still think of
Ken as my mentor.

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You get to choose your mentors.

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You don't always get to
choose your teachers.

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Yeah, does that
answer your question?

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And in terms of--

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that's work that I
always go back to.

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But I go back, I read Whitman.

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I love the Prelude.

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I read Prelude every other year.

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It seems there is also a
tremendous sort of strangeness

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and audacity and
youthfulness and vigor.

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I love Tomaz Salamun.

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He's someone I
read all the time.

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So I'm able to exhaust his work.

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[INAUDIBLE]

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Who are some of
the younger poets

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that you want to
feed off of next?

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Oh Jesus, there's
really a lot of them.

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Sarah Manguso wrote
a wonderful book,

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whose title I can't remember.

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The captain's island?

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The captain lands in paradise.

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What is it?

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The captain lands in paradise.

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Yeah.

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Peter Richards's
new book is tricky.

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But I think Matthew Rohrer.

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Matthew is [INAUDIBLE].

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Those guys are really
good young poets.

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There's a lot of good ones.

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Matthea Harvey is terrific.

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Let's see.

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Who else.

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Somebody else I
just read a book,

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it just knocked my socks off.

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[INAUDIBLE]

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Sorry, I can't remember.

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But it seems like it's a really
good time for young poets now.

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A lot of young poets
are doing not only just

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publishing great work but also
getting involved in publishing.

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Verse Press I think
just does a great job.

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Alice James Books has garnered--
has had a rebirth or something

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in the last [INAUDIBLE] years.

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And the books they
have been publishing

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have just been terrific.

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And they've been mostly,
about 2/3 young poets.

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And that's-- look, Verse
and Alice James are--

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when I go into the bookstore
and to see a new book of poems

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by somebody on that list,
I just buy it and read it.

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Because I feel like
they're really doing stuff.

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There's some good new magazines,
like Jubilat, Conduit.

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So I think it's a
good time for poetry.

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I hate not being young.

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[LAUGHTER]

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[INAUDIBLE]

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You talked about how
when you were in Indiana,

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and you started
figuring out if you

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were interested in New York,
and that was the thing that you

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wanted to be writing.

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How is it that you started
figuring out what you

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want to do, because [INAUDIBLE]

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Well, it wasn't-- it's never
it never existed before we get

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there.

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You just write and try to figure
out what it is you're doing.

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And then it starts--

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it's not like I decided.

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It's just that I felt,
I felt permission.

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And I think that's
one of the things

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that you look for in poets.

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And those poets, I suppose,
the poets that I return to

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again and again--

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Ashbery is another
one-- where I feel

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permission being given
that other poets make

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me feel like that how I want
to put language together

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is not poetry.

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So it wasn't-- there was a lot
of poetry that I knew that I

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couldn't write.

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And there was-- and that usually
had to do with sensibility.

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And it's thinking about art.

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I'm very suspicious about
sensibility that obviously

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bases itself upon suffering.

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The notion of the authenticity
of the work of art

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is based upon a kind
of back body count.

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And I remember, when I
was in graduate school,

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trying to write poems that
were based upon suffering

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and feeling bogus about it.

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And so it was hard
to figure out what

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could be a justifiable and
inspiring source of poetry

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for me then.

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And then it was through
the New York School

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that I discovered comedy.

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And I don't necessarily mean
comedy as telling jokes.

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I mean comedy as a sense
of lightness, and levity,

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and inventiveness.

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And an open spiritness.

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And it allows for a
lot of strange things

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to happen [INAUDIBLE].

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And when I was in Indiana,
there wasn't anybody who was--

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when I was in Indiana, nobody
knew who Frank O'Hara was and I

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mean, who John Ashbery was.

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I feel like I
discovered Frank O'Hara.

00:11:05.340 --> 00:11:06.255 align:middle line:90%
[INAUDIBLE]

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[LAUGHS]

00:11:08.195 --> 00:11:12.533 align:middle line:90%


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Do you still feel
when you write,

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there are certain things
that you don't feel

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like you have permission to do?

00:11:18.720 --> 00:11:21.062 align:middle line:84%
[INAUDIBLE] feel
the writing things.

00:11:21.062 --> 00:11:22.508 align:middle line:90%
And that's a huge one.

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It meant a lot.

00:11:23.310 --> 00:11:24.918 align:middle line:90%
It was very different.

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And obviously you need
some kind of sanction

00:11:27.328 --> 00:11:28.780 align:middle line:90%
to be confident to do.

00:11:28.780 --> 00:11:32.410 align:middle line:84%
Is there still stuff that you
don't feel confident in doing?

00:11:32.410 --> 00:11:36.970 align:middle line:90%
I'm still very aware of failing.

00:11:36.970 --> 00:11:39.610 align:middle line:84%
I mean, one of the
things is, when

00:11:39.610 --> 00:11:42.960 align:middle line:84%
I was younger I
needed authentication.

00:11:42.960 --> 00:11:45.890 align:middle line:84%
When you haven't
published anything

00:11:45.890 --> 00:11:49.411 align:middle line:84%
and you haven't finished
any books, it's a little--

00:11:49.411 --> 00:11:51.730 align:middle line:90%
you really do need that.

00:11:51.730 --> 00:11:53.040 align:middle line:90%
It's hard.

00:11:53.040 --> 00:11:55.050 align:middle line:90%
You feel doubts.

00:11:55.050 --> 00:11:57.540 align:middle line:84%
And feel doubts about
what you're writing,

00:11:57.540 --> 00:12:00.130 align:middle line:90%
you know, maybe it's not poetry.

00:12:00.130 --> 00:12:02.620 align:middle line:84%
Now I don't worry
about whether or not

00:12:02.620 --> 00:12:03.910 align:middle line:90%
I'm writing poetry or not.

00:12:03.910 --> 00:12:06.430 align:middle line:84%
I'm just worrying
about, I have a sense

00:12:06.430 --> 00:12:08.320 align:middle line:90%
of failing all the time.

00:12:08.320 --> 00:12:13.730 align:middle line:90%
So I think that's the problem.

00:12:13.730 --> 00:12:15.580 align:middle line:84%
That's the problem
that it presents

00:12:15.580 --> 00:12:20.800 align:middle line:84%
a way of trying to
discover permission.

00:12:20.800 --> 00:12:22.420 align:middle line:84%
I think they're
probably related.

00:12:22.420 --> 00:12:25.386 align:middle line:84%
They just have different kinds
of different [INAUDIBLE] fears

00:12:25.386 --> 00:12:26.040 align:middle line:90%
of that.

00:12:26.040 --> 00:12:28.873 align:middle line:90%


00:12:28.873 --> 00:12:31.290 align:middle line:84%
And you always have a sense
of failing when we're writing.

00:12:31.290 --> 00:12:32.880 align:middle line:84%
If you write a poem,
it's a page long,

00:12:32.880 --> 00:12:35.047 align:middle line:84%
you think, "Oh my God, I
can't write a short poem."

00:12:35.047 --> 00:12:36.360 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:12:36.360 --> 00:12:38.860 align:middle line:84%
A short poem, I think,
what's the matter with me?

00:12:38.860 --> 00:12:40.360 align:middle line:84%
I don't even have
an attention span.

00:12:40.360 --> 00:12:44.790 align:middle line:90%


00:12:44.790 --> 00:12:45.820 align:middle line:90%
I have a question.

00:12:45.820 --> 00:12:50.470 align:middle line:84%
Do you consider your audience or
readers at all when you write,

00:12:50.470 --> 00:12:54.212 align:middle line:84%
or is it mostly just for your
own personal pleasure of sense

00:12:54.212 --> 00:12:56.270 align:middle line:90%
of making art.

00:12:56.270 --> 00:12:57.145 align:middle line:90%
I hate this question.

00:12:57.145 --> 00:12:59.200 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:12:59.200 --> 00:13:02.260 align:middle line:84%
The reason I hate this question
is because I have to be honest

00:13:02.260 --> 00:13:04.730 align:middle line:84%
and I don't worry
about audience at all.

00:13:04.730 --> 00:13:05.230 align:middle line:90%
OK.

00:13:05.230 --> 00:13:07.900 align:middle line:90%


00:13:07.900 --> 00:13:11.175 align:middle line:84%
Because I'm the
only one who knows.

00:13:11.175 --> 00:13:13.245 align:middle line:90%
And I don't [INAUDIBLE]

00:13:13.245 --> 00:13:14.270 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:13:14.270 --> 00:13:16.350 align:middle line:90%
It's got to get by me.

00:13:16.350 --> 00:13:22.650 align:middle line:84%
And then if it interests me,
then it's just a matter of,

00:13:22.650 --> 00:13:26.910 align:middle line:84%
is it lousy and I throw
it away, or does it work.

00:13:26.910 --> 00:13:29.420 align:middle line:84%
But in terms of the audience,
I did worry about audience

00:13:29.420 --> 00:13:31.430 align:middle line:90%
when I was young.

00:13:31.430 --> 00:13:37.760 align:middle line:84%
And I think of my first book,
which if I ever published it,

00:13:37.760 --> 00:13:39.290 align:middle line:84%
a selected poems,
I wouldn't publish

00:13:39.290 --> 00:13:40.880 align:middle line:90%
any poems from that book.

00:13:40.880 --> 00:13:41.420 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:13:41.420 --> 00:13:45.850 align:middle line:84%
Because I felt like it was
all about trying to write

00:13:45.850 --> 00:13:50.180 align:middle line:84%
poems that appeals
to the audience.

00:13:50.180 --> 00:13:53.280 align:middle line:84%
And basically, audience is
a conservative phenomenon.

00:13:53.280 --> 00:13:57.410 align:middle line:90%


00:13:57.410 --> 00:14:01.910 align:middle line:84%
Theory, criticism, audience--
it's always behind the art.

00:14:01.910 --> 00:14:06.180 align:middle line:84%
And we always-- it's always
two days late at least.

00:14:06.180 --> 00:14:12.950 align:middle line:84%
And so it's important just sort
of keep trying to push things.

00:14:12.950 --> 00:14:16.700 align:middle line:84%
And it doesn't really matter if
any of us read any more poems.

00:14:16.700 --> 00:14:17.780 align:middle line:90%
It doesn't.

00:14:17.780 --> 00:14:21.560 align:middle line:90%
It only matters to me.

00:14:21.560 --> 00:14:23.504 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:14:23.504 --> 00:14:25.934 align:middle line:90%


00:14:25.934 --> 00:14:26.910 align:middle line:90%
[INAUDIBLE]

00:14:26.910 --> 00:14:29.350 align:middle line:84%
With such an eclectic
tapestry of images,

00:14:29.350 --> 00:14:33.540 align:middle line:84%
I'm wondering what your guilty
non-literary pleasures are.

00:14:33.540 --> 00:14:35.010 align:middle line:90%
Reading Popular Mechanics, or--

00:14:35.010 --> 00:14:36.698 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:14:36.698 --> 00:14:39.030 align:middle line:84%
You know, I've got some old
issues of Popular Mechanics

00:14:39.030 --> 00:14:40.170 align:middle line:90%
that I just love.

00:14:40.170 --> 00:14:44.850 align:middle line:84%
And I've stolen
lines of this stuff.

00:14:44.850 --> 00:14:49.006 align:middle line:84%
You know I-- a guilty
pleasure-- man.

00:14:49.006 --> 00:14:51.600 align:middle line:84%
[INAUDIBLE] that's
a problem of me

00:14:51.600 --> 00:14:53.310 align:middle line:84%
that I don't feel
guilty about pleasures.

00:14:53.310 --> 00:14:55.492 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:14:55.492 --> 00:14:59.320 align:middle line:90%


00:14:59.320 --> 00:15:02.080 align:middle line:84%
Oh, my favorite show
on television right

00:15:02.080 --> 00:15:03.170 align:middle line:90%
now is Extreme Makeover.

00:15:03.170 --> 00:15:03.670 align:middle line:90%
Oh!

00:15:03.670 --> 00:15:06.035 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE]

00:15:06.035 --> 00:15:06.981 align:middle line:90%


00:15:06.981 --> 00:15:11.230 align:middle line:84%
It's very [INAUDIBLE]
I have a lot of--

00:15:11.230 --> 00:15:13.840 align:middle line:84%
personally, well, I
explained the big idea

00:15:13.840 --> 00:15:15.340 align:middle line:90%
before I explain the personal.

00:15:15.340 --> 00:15:18.250 align:middle line:84%
But for the most part,
most of the shows we watch

00:15:18.250 --> 00:15:22.030 align:middle line:84%
are built upon pursuit
and attainment.

00:15:22.030 --> 00:15:26.080 align:middle line:84%
And they're usually built around
either some sort of either

00:15:26.080 --> 00:15:28.030 align:middle line:84%
they're a half-hour
thing, and they're

00:15:28.030 --> 00:15:31.750 align:middle line:84%
built with that around
some sort of silly familial

00:15:31.750 --> 00:15:32.928 align:middle line:90%
misunderstanding.

00:15:32.928 --> 00:15:34.345 align:middle line:84%
Which is the notion
of somehow

00:15:34.345 --> 00:15:36.010 align:middle line:90%
it's the family drama.

00:15:36.010 --> 00:15:39.250 align:middle line:84%
But most of the shows
that are in our lives

00:15:39.250 --> 00:15:43.570 align:middle line:90%
are built around violence.

00:15:43.570 --> 00:15:46.960 align:middle line:84%
And they come to a solution
as if somehow or another

00:15:46.960 --> 00:15:50.380 align:middle line:84%
that absolves us of
the violence that

00:15:50.380 --> 00:15:54.820 align:middle line:84%
occurred to create the whole
damn show to begin with.

00:15:54.820 --> 00:15:57.975 align:middle line:84%
Radical makeover is entirely
about the achievement

00:15:57.975 --> 00:15:58.475 align:middle line:90%
of beauty.

00:15:58.475 --> 00:16:00.450 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:16:00.450 --> 00:16:07.720 align:middle line:84%
We can critique the meetings
and the kind of beauty.

00:16:07.720 --> 00:16:10.430 align:middle line:84%
But it is-- as far
as I can tell--

00:16:10.430 --> 00:16:13.561 align:middle line:84%
the only show that's based
upon attaining beauty.

00:16:13.561 --> 00:16:14.503 align:middle line:90%
[INAUDIBLE]

00:16:14.503 --> 00:16:16.387 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:16:16.387 --> 00:16:20.120 align:middle line:84%
As I said, I was originally
going to be a doctor.

00:16:20.120 --> 00:16:22.570 align:middle line:84%
And then I realized, I
didn't like sick people.

00:16:22.570 --> 00:16:23.620 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:16:23.620 --> 00:16:27.070 align:middle line:84%
Then I was going to
become a psychiatrist.

00:16:27.070 --> 00:16:30.550 align:middle line:84%
And then I realized, I
didn't like depressed people.

00:16:30.550 --> 00:16:31.198 align:middle line:90%
OK.

00:16:31.198 --> 00:16:32.950 align:middle line:90%
Become a plastic surgeon.

00:16:32.950 --> 00:16:35.020 align:middle line:84%
You get to see a
lot of people naked.

00:16:35.020 --> 00:16:36.790 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:16:36.790 --> 00:16:40.810 align:middle line:84%
You get to do some
fascinating procedures.

00:16:40.810 --> 00:16:43.210 align:middle line:84%
If you do reconstructive
procedures,

00:16:43.210 --> 00:16:45.250 align:middle line:90%
all kinds of interesting stuff.

00:16:45.250 --> 00:16:48.670 align:middle line:84%
There's a lot of pro
bono work you can do.

00:16:48.670 --> 00:16:50.170 align:middle line:90%
So I'm interested in that.

00:16:50.170 --> 00:16:51.210 align:middle line:90%
Also the notion of ---

00:16:51.210 --> 00:16:54.760 align:middle line:84%
I'm very interested in
transformation science fiction.

00:16:54.760 --> 00:16:59.724 align:middle line:84%
There's Werewolf, Frankenstein,
and it's sort of that too.

00:16:59.724 --> 00:17:01.960 align:middle line:90%
With Dr. Frankenstein's moves.

00:17:01.960 --> 00:17:05.868 align:middle line:84%
And the thing they
could do with teeth now.

00:17:05.868 --> 00:17:07.452 align:middle line:84%
My God, these people
come out, they

00:17:07.452 --> 00:17:08.910 align:middle line:84%
have teeth you
could cut wire with.

00:17:08.910 --> 00:17:13.689 align:middle line:90%


00:17:13.689 --> 00:17:14.814 align:middle line:90%
Time for one more question.

00:17:14.814 --> 00:17:18.119 align:middle line:90%


00:17:18.119 --> 00:17:18.619 align:middle line:90%
Yeah.

00:17:18.619 --> 00:17:21.740 align:middle line:84%
On that topic, What is
one thing you have never

00:17:21.740 --> 00:17:25.672 align:middle line:90%
pursued that you would like to?

00:17:25.672 --> 00:17:28.510 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:17:28.510 --> 00:17:42.630 align:middle line:90%


00:17:42.630 --> 00:17:48.990 align:middle line:84%
Well, [LAUGHS] a lot
of women in my life.

00:17:48.990 --> 00:17:51.660 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:17:51.660 --> 00:17:54.820 align:middle line:90%
But there are things that--

00:17:54.820 --> 00:17:55.830 align:middle line:90%
what am I not doing?

00:17:55.830 --> 00:18:04.110 align:middle line:84%
I wish I would spend more
time working on visual art.

00:18:04.110 --> 00:18:08.860 align:middle line:84%
I wish I would have committed
to that a little bit more.

00:18:08.860 --> 00:18:12.340 align:middle line:84%
And I still have time, but
I get taken away from it.

00:18:12.340 --> 00:18:15.080 align:middle line:90%
And I have absolutely no skill.

00:18:15.080 --> 00:18:17.890 align:middle line:84%
And a lot of the times,
I do in fact wish

00:18:17.890 --> 00:18:23.260 align:middle line:84%
that I would have stayed on
the course for med school.

00:18:23.260 --> 00:18:26.250 align:middle line:84%
Because the knowledge
is a wonderful thing.

00:18:26.250 --> 00:18:30.700 align:middle line:84%
Actually pursuing--
that was something.

00:18:30.700 --> 00:18:32.298 align:middle line:90%
That's a good question.

00:18:32.298 --> 00:18:36.430 align:middle line:90%


00:18:36.430 --> 00:18:38.890 align:middle line:90%
Yes, I need to read Proust too.

00:18:38.890 --> 00:18:40.090 align:middle line:90%
[LAUGHTER]

00:18:40.090 --> 00:18:43.390 align:middle line:90%


00:18:43.390 --> 00:18:45.840 align:middle line:90%
[APPLAUSE]

00:18:45.840 --> 00:18:47.000 align:middle line:90%