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Politics : The Donkey's Inn -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: Raymond Duray who wrote (5954)2/3/2003 4:39:12 PM
From: Mephisto  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 15516
 
The public library in Portland should have a copy of the NYTimes. I haven't had time to read
it closely. Also, I was ticked off at their anti-war stance so I was dumping the newspaper the
day it arrived.

You might be able to buy a back issue! You could phone the NYTimes for information.



To: Raymond Duray who wrote (5954)2/3/2003 4:40:07 PM
From: Mephisto  Respond to of 15516
 
First lady postpones poetry talk over protest fear

Gary Younge
Friday January 31, 2003
The Guardian

The White House has postponed a poetry symposium
scheduled for next month for fear that the poets would use it to
protest against the war.

The symposium on the poetry of Emily Dickinson, Langston
Hughes and Walt Whitman was to be held by the first lady,
Laura Bush, on February 12.

But as the prospect grew that it would draw protests from poets
Mrs Bush was forced to put it off to an unspecified date.

Sam Hamill, a poet and founder of the highly regarded Copper
Canyon Press, declined the invitation and emailed friends asking
for anti-war poems or statements. He encouraged those who
planned to attend to bring along anti-war poems.


Mr Hamill said he had received more than 1,500 contributions,
including ones from poets Adrienne Rich and Lawrence
Ferlinghetti.

"While Mrs Bush respects the right of all Americans to express
their opinions, she, too, has opinions and believes it would be
inappropriate to turn a literary event into a political forum," Noelia
Rodriguez, Mrs Bush's spokeswoman, said.

"The idea that you could have an non-political event celebrating
the work of Walt Whitman, a gay poet writing about what
America could be during the civil war is absurd," said Todd
Swift,
the Paris-based editor of the ebook 100 Poets Against the
War, which was released on Monday. "The voice of a poet can
echo across history at different points in time."

Marilyn Nelson, Connecticut's poet laureate, said that she had
accepted the White House invitation and had planned to wear a
silk scarf with peace signs that she commissioned.

"I had decided to go because I felt my presence would promote
peace," she said. "I had commissioned a fabric artist for a silk
scarf with peace signs painted on it. I thought just by going
there and shaking Mrs Bush's hand and being available for the
photo ops, my scarf would make a statement."

Another state poet laureate, New Jersey's Amiri Baraka, was
also involved in a recent political controversy.

Baraka, formerly known as LeRoi Jones, wrote a poem about
September 11 which implied that Israelis had prior knowledge
the attacks would take place and did not go to work. The
governor of New Jersey is under increasing pressure to fire him.

books.guardian.co.uk