Poetry Podcasts for National Poetry Month

Poetry is best appreciated when read aloud, especially so when read by the poets themselves. Present-day technology has brought forth a wealth of opportunities to hear the voices of poets past and present.  A superb source of poetry read by the poet is The Poetry Archive which offers the voices of classic poets going as far back as Browning and Tennyson (yes, really!) along with contemporary poets and everything in between.

The Poetry Archive came into being as a result of a meeting, in a recording studio, between Andrew Motion, soon after he became U.K. Poet Laureate in 1999, and the recording producer, Richard Carrington.  Its mission statement reminds us that "poetry was an oral art form before it became textual. Homer's work lived through the spoken word long before any markings were made on a page. Hearing a poet reading his or her work remains uniquely illuminating. It helps us to understand the work as well as helping us to enjoy it. When a poet dies without making a recording, a precious resource is lost for ever and as time goes by that loss is felt more and more keenly. What would we not give to be able to hear Keats and Byron reading their work?"

To reach The Poetry Archive click here

These are other excellent sources of poetry aloud --

The Poet and the Poem (Library of Congress)

Poem of the Day (Poetry Foundation)

The Poetic Voice (Houghton Mifflin Publishers)

Classic Poetry Aloud (PodOmatic)

Poets.org (The Academy of American Poets)

PEN Podcasts (PEN American Center)

Books That Changed America

Robert B. Downs

In 1970, librarian and scholar Robert B. Downs created this list of twenty-five books in order to, as Downs put it,  "identify those writings which have exerted the greatest impact on our national history, direct or indirect."

Published by Macmillan as Books That Changed America, the list of twenty-five was Downs' response to those he called "denigrators of books, such as Marshall McLuhan, [who] would have us believe that books are obsolescent, being rapidly superseded by the newer media."

This is a reminder that the books versus new media battle was raging before the development of the internet or the personal computer. Also, Downs' list of twenty-five includes two books -- Rachel Carson's Silent Spring (1962) and J.K. Galbraith's The Affluent Society (1958) -- that were published within just twelve years of the time he was writing.  In his introduction Downs mentions two other even more recent books -- Ralph Nader's Unsafe at Any Speed (1965) and Jessica Mitford's The American Way of Death (1963) -- came close to being included in his list.

Today, in 2012, it's hard to think of any book of major importance published recently.

Robert B. Downs' List of 25 Books That Changed America

1.  Common Sense by Thomas Paine (1776)
2.  History of the Expedition by Lewis and Clark (1814)
3.  The Book of Mormon by Joseph Smith (1830)
4.  Experiments and Observations on the Gastric Juice and the Physiology of Digestion by William Beaumont (1833)
5.   Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville (1835)
6.   Annual Reports (of the Massachusetts State Board of Education) by Horace Mann (1837-1848)
7.   The Contagiousness of Puerperal Fever by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1843)
8.   Resistance to Civil Government by Henry David Thoreau (1849)
9.   Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe (1852)
10. Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy (1888)
11. The Influence of Sea Power upon History by Alfred T. Mahan (1890)
12. The Significance of the Frontier in American History by Frederick Jackson Turner (1893)
13. The Shame of the Cities by Lincoln Steffens (1904)
14. The Jungle by Upton Sinclair (1906)
15. Medical Education in the United States and Canada by Abraham Flexner (1910)
16. Twenty Years at Hull-House by Jane Addams (1910)
17. The Principles of Scientific Management by Frederick Winslow Taylor (1911)
18. An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States by Charles A. Beard (1913)
19. Prejudices by H.L. Mencken (6 volumes, 1919-1927)
20. The Nature of the Judicial Process by Benjamin N. Cardozo (1921)
21. Middletown by Robert S. and Helen Merrell Lynd (1929)
22. The Mind of the South by W.J. Cash (1941)
23. An American Dilemma by Gunnar Myrdal (1944)
24. The Affluent Society by John Kenneth Galbraith (1958)
25. Silent Spring by Rachel Carson (1962)

Top Writers Read Their Favorite Story Written by Another Writer

In this beautifully done podcast series produced by the Guardian, leading contemporary writers read their favorite short story written by a writer other than themselves.  Hear Philip Pullman read Chekhov, Margaret Drabble read Katherine Mansfield, Julian Barnes read Hemingway, Helen Dunmore read Frank O'Connor, Ali Smith read Grace Paley, Anne Enright read Raymond Carver, William Boyd read J.G. Ballard, Colm Toibin read Eugene McCabe, Rose Tremain read Yiyun Li, Jeanette Winterson read Italo Calvino, Tessa Hadley read Elizabeth Bowen, and Helen Simpson read Angela Carter.

Click here to reach the podcast series website.

Phone Booths as Libraries

Perhaps phone booths won't entirely disappear from the scene after all.   In both the United States and Britain, some people think they make good libraries. The Committee Room isn't so sure.  

Check out (no pun intended) these articles --  

Repurposed Phone Booth Library in NYC. Designboom. February 2012 (photo above).

Image from Mystery Fanfare

Red Phone Box Turned into Little Eaton Village Library. BBC News (Derby). December 31, 2011 (photo at left).

TCR's List of Ten Overused Phrases

Master the use of these phrases and begin your career as a pundit --

I would argue
That said
Moving forward
Quite frankly
Game changer
At the end of the day
Crunch time
Wake up call
Red flags
Get it right


To put it another way -- "Quite frankly, I would argue, this is a wake up call.  The red flags were ignored. It's crunch time.  That said, moving forward, this will be a game changer and at the end of the day, we've got to get it right."

TCR Story of the Month for March: "Paradise" by Jean Ryan

The Committee Room is thrilled to offer Jean Ryan's "Paradise" as its Story of the Month for March. A brightly told tale of a woman making a new life in Palm Springs after a failed romance in Vermont, "Paradise" is an emotionally truthful and often laugh out loud funny look at human (and animal  -- love that parrot!) nature.

Jean Ryan, a native Vermonter, lives in Napa, California. Her stories and essays have appeared in a variety of journals, including Other Voices, Pleiades, The Summerset Review, The Massachusetts Review and Blue Lake Review. She has also published a novel, Lost Sister (2005). A collection of her short stories will be published by Ashland Creek Press in 2013.

"Paradise" was published by Blue Lake Review (November 2011) and previously appeared in The Massachusetts Review.

To read "Paradise" click here

TCR Story of the Month highlights an outstanding work of fiction published online in the preceding twelve months.

TCR Chats with Jean Ryan

Q: How long have you been writing?

A: Since I was a child. I’ve had dry periods that lasted more than a year, but inevitably I am pulled back. Translating ideas and experience into words is how I make sense of the world. Finding the right phrasing is a tremendous challenge—like tuning a musical instrument, perhaps: one just knows when the right chord has been struck. This intuitive knack may be the one thing that can’t be taught in writing classes. Humor, another element I strive for, is also challenging. Like other aspects of composition, it is best approached from the side. Jean Thompson does humor very well.

Q: What was the inspiration for “Paradise”?

A:  I had watched a program about intelligence in birds, parrots in particular. One bird had acquired a prodigious vocabulary and this stirred my imagination. I thought it would be fun to work this creature into a story, to use him in fact as a main character. In order to create conflict, the parrot in this tale is malicious as well as brilliant. The extravagance of Palm Springs, its artificial overlay, seemed an apt parallel to the various indulgences that Max enjoyed in his man-made abode.

Q: Who are some of your favorite contemporary writers? 

A: I love the immediacy and brevity of short stories and some of my favorite contemporary authors are masters of this form. Among many others, I admire the work of Lorrie Moore, Helen Simpson, Amy Bloom, Antonya Nelson, Jean Thompson, James Lasdun, Marisa Silver, Annie Proulx, Rick Bass and Joy Williams. Russell Hoban’s Turtle Diary is one of my favorite novels, along with J. L. Carr’s A Month in the Country and Rhine Maidens by Carolyn See. In the genre of poetry, I am in constant awe of Mary Oliver. 

Q: Favorite classic authors?

A: Virginia Woolf of course. And Anton Chekov. Graham Greene is wonderful, along with George Orwell, J.D. Salinger, John Steinbeck, Harper Lee and E.M. Forster. I also admire Paul Bowles and the eerie suspense he was able to create. My favorite Hemingway work would have to be A Moveable Feast. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is an exquisite novel.

Hear Authors Read Their Work on The Writers' Block Podcasts

A decade or so ago, even unknown authors often found themselves on publisher-funded promotional tours.  Bookstores worked overtime to keep up with busy schedules of reading/signing events for authors passing through town. Those days are gone but we can now console ourselves with podcasts.  Hear the voices of contemporary authors of both fiction and non-fiction at The Writers' Block, an impressive series of podcasts put out by KQED, San Francisco's NPR/PBS outlet.  Writers can also submit their own work to the series.  The focus is on younger writers so you're likely to encounter some new, interesting voices.