'Genius and need' wins prose poet Gary Young Shelley Memorial award
The Poetry Society of America (PSA) has placed US prose poet Gary Young in the company of such luminaries as Elizabeth Bishop and EE Cummings after naming him the recipient of its prestigious Shelley Memorial award.
Established in 1929, with Conrad Aiken the first winner, the $3,500 (£2,500) award is given annually to a living American poet "selected with reference to genius and need". Previous winners include Cummings, Bishop, Gary Snyder and Robert Creeley.
Young, a lecturer at the University of California, Santa Cruz, said it was "incredibly humbling to be in their company". "It's always gratifying whenever one's work is recognised and valued, but to receive the Shelley award is particularly satisfying," he added. "Two of my dear friends and mentors, men with whom I studied as a young man — William Everson at UC Santa Cruz, and James McMichael at UC Irvine — also won the Shelley award."
"I'm never smarter than I am when I'm writing a poem," he once said in an interview. "The seductiveness of that intelligence - which seems to exist outside and independent of my own limited intellectual capacity - is best played out in my own mind by simple declaration. I don't think poems should be puzzles - the world is puzzling enough. I want my poems to be windows: as clear as possible."
Established in 1929, with Conrad Aiken the first winner, the $3,500 (£2,500) award is given annually to a living American poet "selected with reference to genius and need". Previous winners include Cummings, Bishop, Gary Snyder and Robert Creeley.
Young, a lecturer at the University of California, Santa Cruz, said it was "incredibly humbling to be in their company". "It's always gratifying whenever one's work is recognised and valued, but to receive the Shelley award is particularly satisfying," he added. "Two of my dear friends and mentors, men with whom I studied as a young man — William Everson at UC Santa Cruz, and James McMichael at UC Irvine — also won the Shelley award."
"I'm never smarter than I am when I'm writing a poem," he once said in an interview. "The seductiveness of that intelligence - which seems to exist outside and independent of my own limited intellectual capacity - is best played out in my own mind by simple declaration. I don't think poems should be puzzles - the world is puzzling enough. I want my poems to be windows: as clear as possible."
posted by temporal at 3/13/2009
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