Knox Pods

Knox County Public Library

Library programs on a variety of topics―mostly book and author talks―and some Knoxville, Tenn. history. read less
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Episodes

The Beat: Denton Loving and D.H. Lawrence
Dec 21 2023
The Beat: Denton Loving and D.H. Lawrence
Denton Loving is the author of Crimes Against Birds (Main Street Rag) and Tamp (Mercer University Press). He is also the editor of Seeking Its Own Level: an anthology of writings about water (MotesBooks). He holds a Master of Fine Arts in Writing and Literature from Bennington College. His work has appeared in Iron Horse Literary Review, The Kenyon Review, Tupelo Quarterly, Harvard Divinity Bulletin, The Threepenny Review, and Ecotone. He is a co-founder and editor at EastOver Press and its literary journal Cutleaf.  D.H. Lawrence was born in 1885 in Eastwood, Nottinghamshire in England, and he died in 1930 at Vence in the south of France. Though Lawrence is best known for his novels—he’s the author of Lady Chatterley’s Lover and nearly a dozen others—he also published short stories, plays, essays, criticism, and more than a dozen collections of poetry. Links:Read "Copperhead," "Foundation," and "Hurtling"Read "Humming-Bird"Denton LovingDenton Loving's website"Five Poems by Denton Loving" at Salvation South"Three Poems by Denton Loving" at Harvard Divinity Bulletin"Under the Chestnut Tree" at EcotoneVideo: WANA (Writers Association of Northern Appalachia) Live! Reading Series featuring Denton LovingReview of Tamp at Southern Review of BooksD.H. LawrenceBio, Poems, and Prose at The Poetry FoundationBio and Poems at Poetry.orgMentioned in this episode:KnoxCountyLibrary.orgThank you for listening and sharing this podcast. Explore life-changing resources and events, sign up for newsletters, follow us on social media, and more through our website, www.knoxcountylibrary.org.Rate & review on Podchaser
The Beat: Anna Laura Reeve and William Shakespeare
Sep 28 2023
The Beat: Anna Laura Reeve and William Shakespeare
Anna Laure Reeve was born and raised in Knoxville, and she earned a Master of Arts in Literature & Poetry Writing from the University of Tennessee. Her poems have appeared in Terrain.org, Jet Fuel Review, Another Chicago Magazine, and many others. She recently won Beloit Poetry Journal’s Adrienne Rich Award, and she was a finalist for the Heartwood Poetry Prize and the Ron Rash Award in Poetry. Her book Reaching the Shore of the Sea of Fertility was recently published by Belle Point Press. She is an assistant editor of Juke Joint, a literary magazine based in Jackson, Mississippi.   William Shakespeare was born in Stratford-upon-Avon, most likely in April of 1564. When he was 18, he married Anne Hathaway with whom he had three children. Shakespeare made his living as an actor and playwright, and his works include 38 plays in addition to 154 sonnets and various other types of poetry. Shakespeare died on April 23, 1616.Links:Read an early version of "Tennessee Red Cobb" at Appalachia BareRead "Méniére's Disease" at The RacketRead "Look at Everything" and "Children of Asylum Seekers" at The RacketRead "That time of year thou mayst in me behold (Sonnet 73)" at Poets.orgRead "When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes (Sonnet 29)" at Poets.orgAnna Laura ReeveAnna Laura Reeve's website"Poets in Conversation: Anna Laura Reeve" at Beloit Poetry JournalTwo Poems from Reaching the Shore of the Sea of Fertility by Anna Laura Reeve at ACM"Motherhood Unshorn: A Review of Reaching the Shore of the Sea of Fertility" at Literary MamaWilliam ShakespeareBio and poems at Poets.org"Shakespeare's Life" at Folger Shakespeare Library's siteThe Complete Works of William ShakespeareMentioned in this episode:KnoxCountyLibrary.orgThank you for listening and sharing this podcast. Explore life-changing resources and events, sign up for newsletters, follow us on social media, and more through our website, www.knoxcountylibrary.org.Rate & review on Podchaser
The Beat: Pauletta Hansel and Edna St. Vincent Millay
Aug 30 2023
The Beat: Pauletta Hansel and Edna St. Vincent Millay
Pauletta Hansel is the author of nine collections of poetry, including her latest book Heartbreak Tree. Her work has been featured in Oxford American, Rattle, American Life in Poetry, and Poetry Daily, among others. Hansel was Cincinnati’s first Poet Laureate, and she was the 2022 Writer-in-Residence for The Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County. Edna St. Vincent Millay was born in Rockland, Maine in 1892. Along with her many books of poetry, Millay published plays, a libretto called The King’s Henchman, and she wrote short stories for popular fiction magazines under the pseudonym Nancy Boyd. She was the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize in poetry.Links:Read "I Take My Mother with Me Everywhere" and "After"Read "Postcard from Age 60" at Braided WayRead "Recuerdo" at The Poetry FoundationPauletta HanselPauletta Hansel's website"The Road" at Poetry Daily"The City" at Appalachian Review"May 1, 2020" in The Oxford American"Palindrome" at Still: The JournalVideo: "Meet our 2022 Writer-In-Residence" Cincinnati & Hamilton County Public LibraryEdna St. Vincent MillayBio and poems at The Poetry FoundationBio and poems at Poets.orgThe Millay Society's Audio ArchivesMentioned in this episode:KnoxCountyLibrary.orgThank you for listening and sharing this podcast. Explore life-changing resources and events, sign up for newsletters, follow us on social media, and more through our website, www.knoxcountylibrary.org.Rate & review on Podchaser
The Beat: Gary Metras and Simon Perchik
Jul 31 2023
The Beat: Gary Metras and Simon Perchik
Gary Metras is a retired high school English teacher and college writing instructor. His poems have appeared in America, The Common, Poetry, and many others. Metras has published eight books, including his latest called Vanishing Points. His book Marble Dust is forthcoming from Cervena Barva Press. Metras was the founder, editor, and letterpress printer of Adastra Press, a venture that for forty years specialized in limited editions of poetry chapbooks. In 2018, Metras was appointed the inaugural Poet Laureate of Easthampton, Massachusetts.  Simon Perchik's poems have appeared in The Nation, Poetry, The New Yorker, and many others. He was born in 1923 in Paterson, New Jersey. During World War II, he joined the Army Air Corps, flew 35 missions overseas, and reached the rank of first lieutenant. Thanks to the GI Bill, Perchik attended New York University where he earned a bachelor’s degree and a law degree. He practiced law for 25 years before becoming an assistant DA for Suffolk County and its first environmental prosecutor. He was a prolific writer, and he published more than thirty books of poetry. A November 2000 issue of Library Journal called Simon Perchik “the most widely published unknown poet in America.” Perchik died on June 14, 2022, in New York City. Links:Read "The Engagement" and "Lint" at The Poetry Foundation Read "Another Winter"Read "3" and "482"Gary Metras"April 6, 2022" at One Art"Two Poems by Gary Metras" at Flyfishing and Tying Journal"Art Maker: Gary Metras, Poet" at Daily Hampshire Gazette"In Studio: Gary Metras" by Easthampton Media (via YouTube)Simon Perchik"Simon Perchik, Poet" in The Easthampton Star"Five Poems" at the Poetry FoundationPoems at Poetry NorthwestPoems at Plume"Two Untitled Poems" at The Inflectionist ReviewMentioned in this episode:KnoxCountyLibrary.orgThank you for listening and sharing this podcast. Explore life-changing resources and events, sign up for newsletters, follow us on social media, and more through our website, www.knoxcountylibrary.org.Rate & review on Podchaser
The Beat: Sara Moore Wagner and H.D.
Jun 30 2023
The Beat: Sara Moore Wagner and H.D.
Sara Moore Wagner is the winner of the 2021 Cider Press Review Editors Prize for her book Swan Wife and the 2020 Driftwood Press Manuscript Prize for Hillbilly Madonna. She has published two chapbooks, Tumbling After (Red Bird Chapbooks) and Hooked Through (Five Oaks Press). She won the 2022 Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award, a 2019 Sustainable Arts Foundation award, and she was a 2021 National Poetry Series Finalist. Her work has appeared in Sixth Finch, Beloit Poetry Journal, Waxwing, The Cincinnati Review, Nimrod, Rhino, and others. Wagner's book Lady Wingshot, based on the life of Annie Oakley, won the Blue Lynx Prize and is forthcoming in 2024. H.D. (Hilda Doolittle) was born in 1886 in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and she grew up in Upper Darby near Philadelphia. She attended Bryn Mawr and the University of Pennsylvania. H.D. published numerous books, including poetry, fiction, nonfiction, memoirs, essays, and translations. The publication of her collected and selected poetry helped to establish her as a major poet of the 20th century. H.D.’s work is revered by countless writers and critics, and she’s often thought of as a poet's poet and one of the key figures of the Imagist movement. She died in Zurich, Switzerland, in 1961. Links:Read "Purity Test"Read "Captivity Narrative"Read "Legend Says"Read "Leda"Sara Moore WagnerSara Moore Wagner's website"Anti-Pastoral" at Sixth Finch"Passing It On" at Waxwing"Girl as a Deer Shedding the Velvet" at The Inflectionist Review"Embracing the Half-Wild Creature: A Conversation with Sara Moore Wagner" at The Rumpus "Sara Moore Wagner on 'Getting My Body Back'" at Poetry Society of AmericaH.D. Bio and poems at The Poetry FoundationBio and poems at Poets.org"H.D.: American Poet" in Britannica"Radical Freedom: Poets on the Life and Work of H.D." Live from the IceHouse Tonight (YouTube)Mentioned in this episode:KnoxCountyLibrary.orgThank you for listening and sharing this podcast. Explore life-changing resources and events, sign up for newsletters, follow us on social media, and more through our website, www.knoxcountylibrary.org.
The Beat: Derek N. Otsuji and George Herbert
May 30 2023
The Beat: Derek N. Otsuji and George Herbert
Derek N. Otsuji is the author of the book The Kitchen of Small Hours, which won the Crab Orchard Review Poetry Series Open Competition. He was also awarded the 2019 Tennessee Williams Scholarship from the Sewanee Writers’ Conference. His poems have appeared in The Southern Poetry Review, The Beloit Poetry Journal, The Threepenny Review, The Bennington Review, Harpur Palate, Missouri Review Online, and many others. He is an associate professor of English at Honolulu Community College.      George Herbert was born in 1593 in Montgomery Castle, Wales. He attended Westminster School and then Trinity College, Cambridge. He was ordained as a priest and became the rector at Bemerton. He died in 1633 of consumption at the age of forty. Links: Read "Among the More Innocent Touristic Amusements of the Old Waikiki"Read "Two Boys One Fish Two Eyes" in RhinoRead "Virtue" by George Herbert" at The Poetry FoundationDerek N. OtsujiDerek N. Otsuji's website"How She Loves Music" in Pleiades.Two Poems at Terrain.orgVideo: "Interview with Derek Otsuji, Author of The Kitchen of Small Hours""Theatre of Shadows" at The Poetry FoundationGeorge HerbertBio and poems at the The Poetry FoundationBio and poems at Poets.org"George Herbert: British Poet" in BritannicaVideo: George Herbert - a Welsh-born poet, orator, and priestMentioned in this episode:KnoxCountyLibrary.orgThank you for listening and sharing this podcast. Explore life-changing resources and events, sign up for newsletters, follow us on social media, and more through our website, www.knoxcountylibrary.org.Rate & review on Podchaser
The Beat: Lyn Hejinian Reads Four Poems from The Book of a Thousand Eyes
Mar 29 2023
The Beat: Lyn Hejinian Reads Four Poems from The Book of a Thousand Eyes
In this episode, Lyn Hejinian reads four untitled poems from The Book of A Thousand Eyes.Lyn Hejinian is a poet, translator, editor, and scholar whose literary career has been long associated with Language writing. Hejinian is the author of over twenty-five volumes of poetry and critical prose, the most recent of which are Tribunal (Omnidawn Books, 2019), Positions of the Sun (Belladonna, 2019), and a revised edition of Oxota: A Short Russian Novel (Wesleyan University Press, 2019.) Fall Creek, her latest long poem, is forthcoming from Litmus Press. A book of critical essays titled Allegorical Moments: Call to the Everyday will come out in Fall 2023 (Wesleyan University Press), and The Proposition, a critical edition of Hejinian’s uncollected early work, is forthcoming from the University of Edinburgh Press (spring 2024). She is the editor of Tuumba Press, the co-director (with Travis Ortiz) of Atelos, a literary project commissioning and publishing cross-genre work by poets, and co-editor (with Jane Gregory and Claire Marie Stancek) of Nion Editions, a chapbook press. She lives in Berkeley, California.(Photo by Doug Hall)Links:Read four poems from The Book of a Thousand EyesBrief Interview and more at Omnidawn Press Bio and poems at Poets.orgBio and poems at the Poetry FoundationReadings, Talks, Q&As, and Lectures at PennSoundHejinian's books reviewed by Publishers WeeklyMentioned in this episode:KnoxCountyLibrary.orgThank you for listening and sharing this podcast. Explore life-changing resources and events, sign up for newsletters, follow us on social media, and more through our website, www.knoxcountylibrary.org.Rate & review on Podchaser
The Beat: Jim Minick and Robert Frost
Feb 28 2023
The Beat: Jim Minick and Robert Frost
Jim Minick is the author of two books of poetry, Her Secret Song and Burning Heaven. In addition, he’s published: Finding a Clear Path, a collection of essays; The Blueberry Years: A Memoir of Farm and Family, which won the Southern Independent Booksellers Association’s award for nonfiction; and Fire Is Your Water, a novel that won the Appalachian Book of the Year Award. Minick’s work has appeared in The New York Times, Poets & Writers, Tampa Review, Shenandoah, Orion, Oxford American, and The Sun. His latest nonfiction book, Without Warning: The Tornado of Udall, Kansas, is forthcoming next month, and his latest poetry manuscript, The Intimacy of Spoons, is forthcoming in 2024. He serves as Coeditor of Pine Mountain Sand & Gravel.Robert Frost was born 1874 in San Francisco. Though Frost attended Dartmouth College and Harvard University, he never earned a formal degree. As a young writer, Frost didn’t have much luck publishing in American literary magazines. He spent much of his twenties and thirties farming and teaching. His first book wasn’t published until he was nearly 40 years old—and after he'd sold his New Hampshire farm and moved to England where publishers were more receptive to his work. Frost soon moved back to the U.S. where he lived in Massachusetts and Vermont, and he went on to win four Pulitzer Prizes and the Congressional Medal of Honor. He died in Boston in 1963.Links: Read "The Oven-Bird" Read "Diminished" at Still: The JournalRead "The Collar” and "Still Dark"Jim MinickJim Minick’s website "Why Birds" at Salvation South"Whale Light" at The Ekphrastic Review  "Good Dirt" and "Stress Test" at CutleafWithout Warning: The Tornado of Udall, Kansas at Bison BooksRobert FrostBio and poems at Poets.orgBio and Poems at The Poetry Foundation's websiteMentioned in this episode:KnoxCountyLibrary.orgThank you for listening and sharing this podcast. Explore life-changing resources and events, sign up for newsletters, follow us on social media, and more through our website, www.knoxcountylibrary.org.Rate & review on Podchaser
The Beat: Monica Mody and Michael Madhusudan Dutt
Jan 30 2023
The Beat: Monica Mody and Michael Madhusudan Dutt
Monica Mody was born in Ranchi, India. She holds a PhD in East-West Psychology from the California Institute of Integral Studies and an MFA in creative writing from the University of Notre Dame. She is the author of three poetry chapbooks, including Ordinary Annals, and two full-length books, Kala Pani, a cross-genre work, and Bright Parallel, which is forthcoming from Copper Coin. Her writing has won awards including the Sparks Prize Fellowship, the Zora Neale Hurston Award, and a Toto Award for Creative Writing. Her work has been published in Poetry International, Indian Quarterly, Almost Island, Dusie, The Fabulist, and anthologies including Future Library: Contemporary Indian Writing and The Penguin Book of Indian Poets. Poet and dramatist Michael Madhusudan Dutt was born in Bengal, India. He studied several languages and was well-versed in English and European literature. In 1861, Dutt published the epic poem Meghnadbadh Kabya, which is, perhaps, his most famous work. Between 1858 and 1874, Dutt penned at least nine plays, including three translations. He is known for his experimentation with verse forms, introducing blank verse in Bengali literature and the sonnet in Bengali—through a reconstruction of both Petrarchan and Shakespearean forms.Links:Read "Glass House--Anthropocene" and "That I exist only as a speck on your bloodshot eyes but I am willing to sweat"Read "Sonnets" by Michael Madhusudan DuttMonica Mody's website"What Was Alive" at Yes PoetryInterview with Mody at Poetry Mini InterviewsMody reads from Ordinary Annals at Periodicities' Virtual Reading Series (Video) "Homing Instinct" at The Other Side of HopeMentioned in this episode:KnoxCountyLibrary.orgThank you for listening and sharing this podcast. Explore life-changing resources and events, sign up for newsletters, follow us on social media, and more through our website, www.knoxcountylibrary.org.Rate & review on Podchaser
The Beat: Bernard Clay and Joseph Seamon Cotter Sr.
Nov 30 2022
The Beat: Bernard Clay and Joseph Seamon Cotter Sr.
Bernard Clay was born in Louisville, Kentucky, and he spent most of his childhood and high school years there. He holds an MFA in creative writing from the University of Kentucky, and he is a member of the Affrilachian Poets collective. His work has been published in Appalachian Heritage, The Limestone Review, Blackbone: 25 Years of the Affrilachian Poets, and various other journals and anthologies. His book English Lit was published by Old Cove/Swallow Press in 2021. He lives on a farm in eastern Kentucky with his wife Lauren Kallmeyer, an herbalist who serves as the director of Kentucky Heartwood's Forest Council. Joseph Seamon Cotter Sr. was born on February 2, 1861, in Bardstown, Kentucky, and he died in Lousiville, Kentucky in 1949. When he was just eight years old, he had to leave school to help support his family. At the age of 22, Cotter returned to his formal education and eventually served for more than fifty years as a teacher and administrator in several Louisville schools. In 1891, he married Maria F. Cox; they had three children, including his eldest son, Joseph Seamon Cotter Jr., who was also a talented poet and playwright. According to Oxford Reference, Joseph Cotter Sr. provided an important “voice during one of the most difficult eras of African American history, and he was a man who backed his words with action in building the African American community.” Links:Read "Mr. Nap's Fight" and "Appalachian Smitten"Read "Dr. Booker T. Washington to the National Negro Business League"Bernard ClayBernard Clay's websiteEnglish Lit reviewed in Southern Review of Books Bernard Clay reading at the historic Western Library of the Louisville Free Public LibraryJoseph Seamon Cotter Sr. Bio and poems at Poets.orgBio and Bibliography at the Carnegie Center--Kentucky Writers Hall of FameMentioned in this episode:KnoxCountyLibrary.orgThank you for listening and sharing this podcast. Explore life-changing resources and events, sign up for newsletters, follow us on social media, and more through our website, www.knoxcountylibrary.org.Rate & review on Podchaser