Probably an off night.
I've heard Creeley read over a dozen times over the years. In the 70s he
was usually so drnk and stoned as to be at moments almost incomprehensible.
But that same sense of intimacy that Doug reports was always
there. Usually he talks extempore more than he reads, and usually not
about the poems as such. I remember one reading at which he talked for a
half hour and then read his then-new poem for his daughter. Amazing that he
could stand up. It was wonderful.
What's astonishing is that he's exactly the same on the podium as in
private conversation, his curious mind folding around the words so
carefully that the conversation is very like the poetry.
He was for me also probably the most useful reader--I simply didn't get
what he was doing musically until I heard him read.
Probably the worst reader I've ever heard was Ashbery in the 70s and 80s.
He apparently hated to do it, and was very uncomfortable. He improved
thereafter, but he's still less than electrifying.
Mark
At 02:24 PM 3/6/2005, you wrote:
>I wish I had been there with you to hear Creeley. I was reading
>on the same program that he was. (I will not vouch for my own
>reading.) He, honestly, was terrible. But, perhaps I am being
>unfair to him and should allow him an off night?
>
>Tom
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