WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.667 align:middle line:84% If you have a question, raise your hand. 00:00:01.667 --> 00:00:02.967 align:middle line:90% I will come to you. 00:00:02.967 --> 00:00:04.050 align:middle line:90% That includes for outside. 00:00:04.050 --> 00:00:06.467 align:middle line:84% I'll try to see through the reflection in the window pane. 00:00:06.467 --> 00:00:07.980 align:middle line:90% I love that you're outside. 00:00:07.980 --> 00:00:10.140 align:middle line:90% You make me happy out there. 00:00:10.140 --> 00:00:11.580 align:middle line:90% Any questions? 00:00:11.580 --> 00:00:17.820 align:middle line:90% 00:00:17.820 --> 00:00:18.790 align:middle line:90% Hi. 00:00:18.790 --> 00:00:20.290 align:middle line:90% Thank you so much. 00:00:20.290 --> 00:00:23.630 align:middle line:84% Would you say a little bit about Antarctica 00:00:23.630 --> 00:00:25.540 align:middle line:90% and how it occurs in your poems? 00:00:25.540 --> 00:00:26.560 align:middle line:90% Yeah, it is a lot. 00:00:26.560 --> 00:00:29.720 align:middle line:90% It shows up a lot. 00:00:29.720 --> 00:00:35.320 align:middle line:84% It shows up twice in Smith Blue, and then that trip. 00:00:35.320 --> 00:00:40.200 align:middle line:84% In 2008, my father retired, and he 00:00:40.200 --> 00:00:45.180 align:middle line:84% got himself a trip to Antarctica on the National Geographic 00:00:45.180 --> 00:00:48.270 align:middle line:90% Lindblad Expeditions trip. 00:00:48.270 --> 00:00:52.170 align:middle line:84% And my mother gets really seasick. 00:00:52.170 --> 00:00:55.230 align:middle line:84% And so she was like, I am not going on the Drake Passage. 00:00:55.230 --> 00:00:57.625 align:middle line:84% And I was like, well, you can't go alone, 00:00:57.625 --> 00:00:58.750 align:middle line:90% someone has to go with you. 00:00:58.750 --> 00:01:00.930 align:middle line:90% So I got to go on the trip. 00:01:00.930 --> 00:01:01.860 align:middle line:90% And it was-- 00:01:01.860 --> 00:01:04.739 align:middle line:84% Antarctica is a place to be if you're 00:01:04.739 --> 00:01:06.780 align:middle line:84% a person who can't stop paying attention 00:01:06.780 --> 00:01:09.570 align:middle line:90% because the sun never sets. 00:01:09.570 --> 00:01:11.445 align:middle line:84% And you can't-- like I like just-- 00:01:11.445 --> 00:01:13.440 align:middle line:84% and the landscape is just so different. 00:01:13.440 --> 00:01:15.870 align:middle line:84% And I just could not not be looking. 00:01:15.870 --> 00:01:17.820 align:middle line:84% And I just took notes and notes and notes, 00:01:17.820 --> 00:01:19.653 align:middle line:90% and I would stay up like insane. 00:01:19.653 --> 00:01:22.320 align:middle line:84% You remember that movie Insomnia where the guy just never slept? 00:01:22.320 --> 00:01:24.450 align:middle line:84% Like I was that person with a notepad, 00:01:24.450 --> 00:01:28.710 align:middle line:84% just taking all these notes about this landscape that was 00:01:28.710 --> 00:01:30.810 align:middle line:90% so-- it was just so different. 00:01:30.810 --> 00:01:33.090 align:middle line:90% I would gauge things wrong. 00:01:33.090 --> 00:01:35.640 align:middle line:84% I kept thinking that the mountains were giant, 00:01:35.640 --> 00:01:36.440 align:middle line:90% like they were 14-- 00:01:36.440 --> 00:01:38.190 align:middle line:84% or they had to be fourteeners because they 00:01:38.190 --> 00:01:39.240 align:middle line:90% were all just like snow. 00:01:39.240 --> 00:01:40.292 align:middle line:90% But it's like this-- 00:01:40.292 --> 00:01:42.000 align:middle line:84% it's like we're way below the tree line-- 00:01:42.000 --> 00:01:43.320 align:middle line:90% above the tree line, right? 00:01:43.320 --> 00:01:45.855 align:middle line:84% That's why there was all snow peaks because-- 00:01:45.855 --> 00:01:47.910 align:middle line:90% and they were like 2,000 feet. 00:01:47.910 --> 00:01:50.130 align:middle line:84% And it's like they're not very high. 00:01:50.130 --> 00:01:53.700 align:middle line:84% But they look to me like what I understand 14,000, and 15,000, 00:01:53.700 --> 00:01:56.910 align:middle line:84% and 16,000-foot peaks to look like because of the way that 00:01:56.910 --> 00:01:57.930 align:middle line:90% the snow was on them. 00:01:57.930 --> 00:02:01.860 align:middle line:84% And that kind of thing, I was like, oh, wait this 00:02:01.860 --> 00:02:02.880 align:middle line:90% is our planet. 00:02:02.880 --> 00:02:05.730 align:middle line:84% And I'm having to completely readjust everything 00:02:05.730 --> 00:02:07.080 align:middle line:90% that I know. 00:02:07.080 --> 00:02:09.300 align:middle line:84% Also when you have bad allergies like me, 00:02:09.300 --> 00:02:13.350 align:middle line:84% Antarctica is amazing because nothing could grow there. 00:02:13.350 --> 00:02:15.810 align:middle line:90% And I was super healthy. 00:02:15.810 --> 00:02:18.208 align:middle line:90% It was awesome. 00:02:18.208 --> 00:02:20.250 align:middle line:84% I don't think McMurdo Station would be like that. 00:02:20.250 --> 00:02:24.210 align:middle line:84% I think it would just be filled with all kinds of human gunk. 00:02:24.210 --> 00:02:26.730 align:middle line:84% So I'm not necessarily going to go there. 00:02:26.730 --> 00:02:31.140 align:middle line:90% 00:02:31.140 --> 00:02:33.210 align:middle line:84% Just in the sense of perspective change, 00:02:33.210 --> 00:02:38.310 align:middle line:84% though, in 2013 and 2014, I was able to go to Southern Africa 00:02:38.310 --> 00:02:39.150 align:middle line:90% a couple of times-- 00:02:39.150 --> 00:02:40.800 align:middle line:90% Namibia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique. 00:02:40.800 --> 00:02:44.070 align:middle line:84% And what I found there was that I kept being like-- 00:02:44.070 --> 00:02:47.520 align:middle line:84% I'm driving across the nation of Namibia, and I'd be like, 00:02:47.520 --> 00:02:51.240 align:middle line:84% oh this looks like Lubbock, this looks like Long Beach, 00:02:51.240 --> 00:02:52.770 align:middle line:90% this looks like Riverside. 00:02:52.770 --> 00:02:59.190 align:middle line:84% Like it just looks so much like Texas and really like 00:02:59.190 --> 00:03:00.870 align:middle line:90% lots of parts of California. 00:03:00.870 --> 00:03:02.820 align:middle line:84% And then I had to just do the opposite thing. 00:03:02.820 --> 00:03:04.920 align:middle line:90% I'm like, I am in Namibia. 00:03:04.920 --> 00:03:06.630 align:middle line:90% Like I am not in So Cal. 00:03:06.630 --> 00:03:07.560 align:middle line:90% Leave that alone. 00:03:07.560 --> 00:03:12.120 align:middle line:84% And that opposite sense of this feels so familiar 00:03:12.120 --> 00:03:14.820 align:middle line:84% that I'm being lazy in my attention 00:03:14.820 --> 00:03:17.100 align:middle line:84% and not paying attention, like that was 00:03:17.100 --> 00:03:19.560 align:middle line:84% the opposite of the Antarctica thing, 00:03:19.560 --> 00:03:22.290 align:middle line:90% where I was like it's so-- 00:03:22.290 --> 00:03:23.730 align:middle line:84% I have no perspective, and so I'm 00:03:23.730 --> 00:03:25.560 align:middle line:90% going to give wrong details. 00:03:25.560 --> 00:03:27.900 align:middle line:84% So anyway, that's how Antarctica happened. 00:03:27.900 --> 00:03:29.880 align:middle line:90% And I took tons of notes. 00:03:29.880 --> 00:03:31.800 align:middle line:84% But I really did get back to the notes 00:03:31.800 --> 00:03:34.350 align:middle line:84% because I was looking for the Antarctic seabird ticks 00:03:34.350 --> 00:03:36.000 align:middle line:90% and then-- 00:03:36.000 --> 00:03:36.968 align:middle line:90% you should journal. 00:03:36.968 --> 00:03:38.010 align:middle line:90% Everybody should journal. 00:03:38.010 --> 00:03:42.240 align:middle line:84% Journaling is very important for being a writer. 00:03:42.240 --> 00:03:42.750 align:middle line:90% What else? 00:03:42.750 --> 00:03:43.870 align:middle line:90% Back of the room. 00:03:43.870 --> 00:03:49.760 align:middle line:90% 00:03:49.760 --> 00:03:50.510 align:middle line:90% Thanks so much. 00:03:50.510 --> 00:03:53.720 align:middle line:84% So you talked about just grief coming into your poems. 00:03:53.720 --> 00:03:55.830 align:middle line:84% And also one thing I know about your work 00:03:55.830 --> 00:03:57.830 align:middle line:84% is you just have this amazing command of history 00:03:57.830 --> 00:03:59.270 align:middle line:90% and just so many facts. 00:03:59.270 --> 00:04:01.142 align:middle line:90% How do you balance-- 00:04:01.142 --> 00:04:02.950 align:middle line:84% I think your work is so beautiful and so 00:04:02.950 --> 00:04:05.900 align:middle line:84% full of amazing details and so much in love with the world. 00:04:05.900 --> 00:04:08.710 align:middle line:84% I think how do you just balance all the information 00:04:08.710 --> 00:04:11.530 align:middle line:84% in your head when you sit down to write the poem kind of thing 00:04:11.530 --> 00:04:14.270 align:middle line:84% and just knowing versus grief and love? 00:04:14.270 --> 00:04:14.770 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:04:14.770 --> 00:04:18.500 align:middle line:84% Well, I guess you don't really have a command of history, 00:04:18.500 --> 00:04:20.000 align:middle line:84% particularly as it is represented 00:04:20.000 --> 00:04:23.290 align:middle line:84% in America, without having an intimate relationship 00:04:23.290 --> 00:04:24.895 align:middle line:90% with grief, all right? 00:04:24.895 --> 00:04:30.280 align:middle line:90% 00:04:30.280 --> 00:04:34.510 align:middle line:84% I feel like-- but I also feel like you can't really-- 00:04:34.510 --> 00:04:37.960 align:middle line:84% we can't understand where we are in this moment-- we certainly 00:04:37.960 --> 00:04:40.120 align:middle line:84% can't understand where we are this moment, 00:04:40.120 --> 00:04:44.230 align:middle line:84% this political moment, without understanding history. 00:04:44.230 --> 00:04:46.510 align:middle line:84% I keep reminding people that the whole reason 00:04:46.510 --> 00:04:49.570 align:middle line:84% for the electoral college was so that a whole bunch 00:04:49.570 --> 00:04:53.140 align:middle line:84% of Southern slave owners could have more vote and more power 00:04:53.140 --> 00:04:54.760 align:middle line:84% because there were fewer of them, 00:04:54.760 --> 00:04:58.450 align:middle line:84% and they wanted more power and control in their election. 00:04:58.450 --> 00:05:02.530 align:middle line:90% And it's still working. 00:05:02.530 --> 00:05:06.370 align:middle line:84% So the way that historical legacies that 00:05:06.370 --> 00:05:12.130 align:middle line:84% are built on exclusion and the pain of certain parties 00:05:12.130 --> 00:05:14.440 align:middle line:84% who don't get their voices continues 00:05:14.440 --> 00:05:18.710 align:middle line:84% to affect how we look forward into the future. 00:05:18.710 --> 00:05:20.980 align:middle line:84% And so I just feel like as a writer, 00:05:20.980 --> 00:05:22.570 align:middle line:90% isn't that part of my job? 00:05:22.570 --> 00:05:26.650 align:middle line:84% Part of my job is to help to consolidate 00:05:26.650 --> 00:05:29.110 align:middle line:84% all this information that is all over the place 00:05:29.110 --> 00:05:31.120 align:middle line:84% and overwhelming and seemingly disparate, 00:05:31.120 --> 00:05:33.250 align:middle line:84% but also to make these connections 00:05:33.250 --> 00:05:38.340 align:middle line:84% and to point out the ways that they are not so disconnected. 00:05:38.340 --> 00:05:39.910 align:middle line:84% In much the way that when we really 00:05:39.910 --> 00:05:43.660 align:middle line:84% understand ocean systems, we learn 00:05:43.660 --> 00:05:48.880 align:middle line:84% that what happens over Hawaii, it affects the storms that 00:05:48.880 --> 00:05:55.540 align:middle line:84% are happening in Seattle, and way down in Peru, 00:05:55.540 --> 00:05:59.470 align:middle line:84% weather in Peru is drawing down all the cold or hot water 00:05:59.470 --> 00:06:00.910 align:middle line:84% in the currents, and there's going 00:06:00.910 --> 00:06:04.010 align:middle line:84% to be very different currents in Juneau, Alaska. 00:06:04.010 --> 00:06:06.160 align:middle line:84% These are all directly connected. 00:06:06.160 --> 00:06:08.510 align:middle line:84% We are all directly connected to everything. 00:06:08.510 --> 00:06:11.720 align:middle line:84% And so I think in poetry, I'm doing that same thing. 00:06:11.720 --> 00:06:14.080 align:middle line:84% And I'm saying so the history of what we did there 00:06:14.080 --> 00:06:15.700 align:middle line:90% when we built that sand dune-- 00:06:15.700 --> 00:06:19.870 align:middle line:84% a change is the history of how this house can stand or not 00:06:19.870 --> 00:06:21.810 align:middle line:90% stand in this place. 00:06:21.810 --> 00:06:25.487 align:middle line:84% And isn't-- like let's talk about the filigree on the gable 00:06:25.487 --> 00:06:27.070 align:middle line:84% in that house, too, while we're at it. 00:06:27.070 --> 00:06:31.810 align:middle line:84% Like it's just-- it's also how my brain works, 00:06:31.810 --> 00:06:38.890 align:middle line:84% but I find it part of my role as a writer is that-- 00:06:38.890 --> 00:06:41.860 align:middle line:84% maybe it's like a version of didacticism 00:06:41.860 --> 00:06:44.470 align:middle line:84% made as pretty as I can possibly make it 00:06:44.470 --> 00:06:47.680 align:middle line:84% and as appealing as I could possibly make it. 00:06:47.680 --> 00:06:49.118 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:06:49.118 --> 00:06:51.160 align:middle line:84% Thank you for that answer or for doing that work? 00:06:51.160 --> 00:06:53.315 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:06:53.315 --> 00:06:54.738 align:middle line:90% We've got time for one more. 00:06:54.738 --> 00:06:57.280 align:middle line:84% We'll do two more because I saw those hands at the same time. 00:06:57.280 --> 00:07:01.100 align:middle line:84% The two hands, yeah, it was like a tie. 00:07:01.100 --> 00:07:07.060 align:middle line:84% How much of your discovery and embrace 00:07:07.060 --> 00:07:10.295 align:middle line:84% of all of the interrelatedness of life 00:07:10.295 --> 00:07:17.890 align:middle line:84% do you think you gain through the process of writing poetry? 00:07:17.890 --> 00:07:18.690 align:middle line:90% Wow! 00:07:18.690 --> 00:07:20.900 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:07:20.900 --> 00:07:21.400 align:middle line:90% 00:07:21.400 --> 00:07:22.090 align:middle line:90% Yes. 00:07:22.090 --> 00:07:25.090 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:07:25.090 --> 00:07:26.590 align:middle line:90% 00:07:26.590 --> 00:07:27.820 align:middle line:90% I think it honed it. 00:07:27.820 --> 00:07:30.460 align:middle line:84% I mean, I think I always thought that way. 00:07:30.460 --> 00:07:32.470 align:middle line:84% But I think that writing poetry honed it. 00:07:32.470 --> 00:07:35.560 align:middle line:84% I think the first book I had really small poems. 00:07:35.560 --> 00:07:37.470 align:middle line:90% And it was like-- 00:07:37.470 --> 00:07:39.515 align:middle line:84% they're all little sonnets, 14-line poems. 00:07:39.515 --> 00:07:41.890 align:middle line:84% And I could be like, OK, I can pull these ideas together, 00:07:41.890 --> 00:07:44.800 align:middle line:84% and I'll write another poem, and another poem, and another poem, 00:07:44.800 --> 00:07:46.750 align:middle line:84% and I'll do that 52 times over and over. 00:07:46.750 --> 00:07:50.217 align:middle line:84% And then as I've developed as a poet, 00:07:50.217 --> 00:07:51.550 align:middle line:90% the poems get longer and longer. 00:07:51.550 --> 00:07:53.050 align:middle line:90% And now I'm writing essays. 00:07:53.050 --> 00:07:55.510 align:middle line:84% And so I'm just like, who knows what's next? 00:07:55.510 --> 00:07:57.310 align:middle line:84% Maybe next time I could actually write 00:07:57.310 --> 00:08:01.120 align:middle line:84% a real memoir, like not a bunch of linked essays that 00:08:01.120 --> 00:08:02.950 align:middle line:90% become a memoir, but like a-- 00:08:02.950 --> 00:08:05.200 align:middle line:90% whew, that sounds scary. 00:08:05.200 --> 00:08:07.660 align:middle line:84% So I think just with time, you learn 00:08:07.660 --> 00:08:10.675 align:middle line:84% how to work those tools with more stamina. 00:08:10.675 --> 00:08:13.390 align:middle line:90% 00:08:13.390 --> 00:08:17.270 align:middle line:84% But I think also it was also innately maybe already there. 00:08:17.270 --> 00:08:19.133 align:middle line:90% Question number two. 00:08:19.133 --> 00:08:20.800 align:middle line:84% I'm just wondering-- like you're kind of 00:08:20.800 --> 00:08:23.530 align:middle line:90% at the apex of Camille Dungy. 00:08:23.530 --> 00:08:24.420 align:middle line:90% I hope not. 00:08:24.420 --> 00:08:25.330 align:middle line:90% I mean in a way-- 00:08:25.330 --> 00:08:27.202 align:middle line:84% Because I haven't won all the prizes, Aisha. 00:08:27.202 --> 00:08:28.660 align:middle line:84% There's three more I'm waiting for. 00:08:28.660 --> 00:08:31.062 align:middle line:84% At this moment, at this very moment. 00:08:31.062 --> 00:08:33.429 align:middle line:84% And I'm just wondering how it all 00:08:33.429 --> 00:08:36.429 align:middle line:84% developed from when you were a kid, like what 00:08:36.429 --> 00:08:39.789 align:middle line:84% you were interested in, and when poetry came in, and? 00:08:39.789 --> 00:08:42.340 align:middle line:84% Poetry's always been part of my life. 00:08:42.340 --> 00:08:47.018 align:middle line:90% My grandmother was a librarian. 00:08:47.018 --> 00:08:51.790 align:middle line:84% My family believed in literature. 00:08:51.790 --> 00:08:55.540 align:middle line:84% I lived for some time in Iowa City, Iowa, 00:08:55.540 --> 00:08:58.750 align:middle line:84% where writers are just people who 00:08:58.750 --> 00:09:00.790 align:middle line:84% need dry cleaning and babysitters 00:09:00.790 --> 00:09:03.010 align:middle line:90% and are normal people. 00:09:03.010 --> 00:09:06.760 align:middle line:84% And so that's important, to be a young writer 00:09:06.760 --> 00:09:09.220 align:middle line:84% and know that writers live, and walk, 00:09:09.220 --> 00:09:13.510 align:middle line:84% and tell you boring stories at the grocery store. 00:09:13.510 --> 00:09:17.020 align:middle line:84% And so-- and so that was part of it. 00:09:17.020 --> 00:09:19.390 align:middle line:84% And then when I went to college, I just 00:09:19.390 --> 00:09:24.250 align:middle line:84% realized that there were ways I could-- 00:09:24.250 --> 00:09:26.620 align:middle line:84% I thought I was going to be a physician because that's 00:09:26.620 --> 00:09:29.200 align:middle line:84% what you do, and then you write on the side. 00:09:29.200 --> 00:09:31.660 align:middle line:84% But basically that's what Ethan Canin does. 00:09:31.660 --> 00:09:33.985 align:middle line:90% Most of us are-- 00:09:33.985 --> 00:09:36.970 align:middle line:84% we have to make a decision whether we're going 00:09:36.970 --> 00:09:40.850 align:middle line:90% to be physicians or doctors. 00:09:40.850 --> 00:09:43.552 align:middle line:84% And so I just decided that that was where 00:09:43.552 --> 00:09:44.760 align:middle line:90% my attention was going to be. 00:09:44.760 --> 00:09:47.135 align:middle line:84% And so that-- it was definitely sophomore year in college 00:09:47.135 --> 00:09:48.610 align:middle line:84% that I can mark as the moment where 00:09:48.610 --> 00:09:52.330 align:middle line:84% I said, all right, that's the track I'm going to be on 00:09:52.330 --> 00:09:53.810 align:middle line:90% and I'm going to dedicate it to. 00:09:53.810 --> 00:09:58.870 align:middle line:84% But then you got to re-- you got to renegotiate that contract 00:09:58.870 --> 00:10:01.330 align:middle line:90% on a regular basis. 00:10:01.330 --> 00:10:03.100 align:middle line:84% That sweet girl I'm trying to write about, 00:10:03.100 --> 00:10:06.250 align:middle line:84% I don't write about her right now because every time I 00:10:06.250 --> 00:10:08.380 align:middle line:84% try and wake up before her, she's like-- 00:10:08.380 --> 00:10:11.680 align:middle line:84% 20 minutes after I wake up, she's like, OK, mom. 00:10:11.680 --> 00:10:15.070 align:middle line:84% I've gotten as early as 5:30, and then I was like, forget it. 00:10:15.070 --> 00:10:18.070 align:middle line:84% I just-- I guess this is just going 00:10:18.070 --> 00:10:21.730 align:middle line:84% to be a quiet time in my life because I'm not getting up 00:10:21.730 --> 00:10:24.370 align:middle line:84% at 4:30 in the morning to try and beat her and then have her 00:10:24.370 --> 00:10:26.590 align:middle line:90% show up at 4:45, right? 00:10:26.590 --> 00:10:28.180 align:middle line:90% I'm not doing it. 00:10:28.180 --> 00:10:30.370 align:middle line:84% And so that just means the new renegotiation. 00:10:30.370 --> 00:10:31.810 align:middle line:84% It means I have to figure out how 00:10:31.810 --> 00:10:38.740 align:middle line:84% I get that work done when my life isn't accommodating it. 00:10:38.740 --> 00:10:41.530 align:middle line:84% But the work has to happen, and that's-- just keep doing that 00:10:41.530 --> 00:10:42.130 align:middle line:90% in your life. 00:10:42.130 --> 00:10:46.891 align:middle line:84% You just have to recommit in different ways. 00:10:46.891 --> 00:10:48.342 align:middle line:90% Camille, thank you so much. 00:10:48.342 --> 00:10:50.800 align:middle line:84% I'm personally so glad that you're a poet and not a doctor. 00:10:50.800 --> 00:10:52.624 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:10:52.624 --> 00:10:53.536 align:middle line:90% I'm being selfish. 00:10:53.536 --> 00:10:55.750 align:middle line:84% Thank you so much for being here. 00:10:55.750 --> 00:10:56.350 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:10:56.350 --> 00:10:59.700 align:middle line:90% [APPLAUSE]