#william meredith

[fageleh]

[unspuncreature]

Accidents of Birth – William Meredith // Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith – Matthew Stover // The Life and Legend of Obi-Wan Kenobi – Ryder Windham

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Life is some kind of loathsome hag who is forever threatening to turn beautiful.

William Meredith, Poem About Morning

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William Meredith’s 100th Birthday

Today is the 100th birthday of William Meredith, American poet and educator.

Meredith won the Pulitzer Prize in 1988 for Partial Accounts: New and Selected Poems and served as the Poet Laureate from 1978-1980. He was a professor of English at Connecticut College from 1955 to 1983.

The Lear Center will have an exhibit celebrating the work and impact of William Meredith opening in mid-March on the first floor of Shain Library. We will be using materials for the William Meredith papers which are held at the Lear Center. The English department will also be honoring the life and work of William Meredith with a two-day event on April 11-.12. It will include readings, a symposium with former students of William Meredith, and reflections from colleagues and friends

This portrait of Meredith was painted by the Bulgarian artist Dora Boneva date is unknown.

[sashayed]

The Illiterate

Touching your goodness, I am like a man Who turns a letter over in his hand And you might think this was because the hand Was unfamiliar but, truth is, the man Has never had a letter from anyone; And now he is both afraid of what it means And ashamed because he has no other means To find out what it says than to ask someone. His uncle could have left the farm to him, Or his parents died before he sent them word, Or the dark girl changed and want him for beloved. Afraid and letter-proud, he keeps it with him. What would you call his feeling for the words That keep him rich and orphaned and beloved?

William Meredith (1919-2007) Effort at Speech: New and Selected Poems, 1997

[limerinthian]

Touching your goodness, I am like a man Who turns a letter over in his hand And you might think this was because the hand Was unfamiliar but, truth is, the man Has never had a letter from anyone; And now he is both afraid of what it means And ashamed because he has no other means To find out what it says than to ask someone. His uncle could have left the farm to him, Or his parents died before he sent them word, Or the dark girl changed and want him for beloved. Afraid and letter-proud, he keeps it with him. What would you call his feeling for the words That keep him rich and orphaned and beloved?

-William Meredith, from “The Illiterate”

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[mohairsweater]

Life is some kind of loathsome hag

Who is forever threatening to turn beautiful