Selected books, music, videos and more. Every order supports this station. Poetry readings are now a major part of our literary landscape.
Most American poets reach wider audiences at readings than through publishing.
In the days before poetry readings became so ubiquitious, however, some of our best poets recorded their work. Random House has just issued a new series of audio cassettes called The Voice of the Poet , edited by poet and Yale Review editor J.D. McClatchy, in which six major 20th-century poets read their work. I'm already familiar with. What I want from a reading is some help, being met at least halfway. I want emotion, but intimacy not melodrama.