BY AYAN CHATTERJEE

In print | Published January 27, 2005

Poetry lovers and budding poets alike were treated to a special event Tuesday night when acclaimed author Louise Glück addressed Swarthmore students, faculty and local residents. The event, sponsored by the Cooper Foundation and the English department, brought out a sizable crowd and filled the LPAC cinema.

The former U.S. poet laureate read selections from her new book, “October.” Introduced by Professor Nathalie Anderson as a poet who “forces wrenching examinations of family and self,” Louise Glück discussed personal drama and tragedy in her second selection, “Prism,” a piece about the myths of romantic love and family life. But her other two works were about wildly different topics. Her third poem, titled “October,” was a deeply private meditation on the attacks of Sept. 11. Political but not in a conventional sense, with no direct references to the event itself, “October” expressed her desire for a safe place to live and told how the events of the day made her realize that yearning was futile. “On a basic level, it’s a poem about the end of the world,” she told the audience before reading.

Not surprisingly, “October” generated ample student response. “I’m usually irritated when artists go into 9/11, but the way she did it was very unique,” Rachel Aucott ’08 said. Katy Feniello ’08 agreed. “The poem that I paid attention to the most was the one that was the most human,” she said.

Earlier that day, students were able to meet with Glück in a more intimate setting for a question-and-answer session. There, she touched upon a variety of topics such as her life as an artist, her work and the creative process, as well as her philosophy of poetry.

On being a poet, she said, “One of the advantages of being young and unknown is having this constant criticism, having all those workshops and conferences. When you have a reputation, you worry that people are saying things to please you.” Glück said she enjoys working with young writers, particularly undergraduates, because they are “constantly exposed to originality, and I feel that it will make me a better writer.” The 62-year-old poet taught at Williams College for 20 years, and has recently taken up a post as writer-in-residence at Yale.

Glück seized the opportunity to dispense advice to the poets attending the afternoon session. In response to a question on what bothers her the most about poetry, Glück told the audience that her greatest gripe was when a poet feels he must prove to his reader that he is well-read or has to contrive his poems to make them seem sophisticated, something she considers a kind of fraud. In contrast, she identified the presence of a fresh, new voice as the most appealing factor in contemporary poetry.

Glück’s work has evolved considerably over many years and 12 books, from traditional collections of poetry to long sequences of poems with common themes. Her 1993 work “The Wild Iris,” was in this trademark style, involving a discourse between flowers of a garden, the gardener, and an unnamed god. It ultimately won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry. During the informal session a few hours before the reading, Glück admitted to students that she considered writing in a book-like style a risk. She then explained how fellow poets like Mark Strand and Robert Pinsky, the latter a former U.S. Poet Laureate himself, helped her find her voice and catalyze in her a burst of creativity that led to “Meadowlands,” the bold 1996 follow-up to “Wild Iris” that combined the collapse of her own marriage with the plot and characters of Homer’s “Odyssey.”

When asked if she identifies with the Romantic poets, Glück replied, “My tastes are much more austere … I like the stern, classical mind.” She added, however, that she considered her writing to be akin to William Blake’s. Indeed, critics have long characterized her work as stark, emotional and lyrical, with a unique and austere voice.

Glück is also the author of “Proofs and Theories,” a collection of essays centered on literature and criticism, which won the PEN/Martha Albrand Award for Nonfiction.

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