{"id":1472,"date":"2011-08-14T17:42:23","date_gmt":"2011-08-14T21:42:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/beatrice.com\/wordpress\/?p=1472"},"modified":"2018-03-16T12:05:53","modified_gmt":"2018-03-16T16:05:53","slug":"read-this-philip-levine-lev-grossman-neal-stephenson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/beatrice.com\/wordpress\/2011\/08\/14\/read-this-philip-levine-lev-grossman-neal-stephenson\/","title":{"rendered":"Read This: Philip Levine, Lev Grossman, Neal Stephenson"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Philip Levine became America’s new poet laureate<\/a> last week, so I put together a brief roundup of links to some of his best poems and a choice quote from his Paris Review<\/i> interview for USA’s Character Approved blog. If I’d been able to fit it in, I’d also have included another quote from Levine’s 1999 Atlantic<\/i> interview<\/a>: “When I began writing poetry I thought language could do anything. And I thought I could do anything with language… But as I got older, I began to realize, both in daily living and in what I read and what I wrote, that I was often coming up against the limits of my ability to use language, or my ability to comprehend language.” Because Levine’s pushing up against those limits in ways few poets can match, engaging with the world in genuinely inspiring way—for all the recognition he’s received throughout his career, I’m really glad he’s been tapped for this honor.<\/p>\n

I also wrote a Character Approved post about Concord Free Press giving its books away<\/a>, which is supported by, among other things, their new e-book imprint, Concord ePress<\/a>. And over at inReads.com, the latest installment of my “Whatcha Reading?” video interview series features Lev Grossman’s enthusiasm<\/a> for the upcoming Neal Stephenson novel, Reamde<\/i><\/a>.<\/p>\n