Summer 2005 - Sept
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Poetry
Poem Review
Book Review
Interviews
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Interview Conducted by Andrew Angus
Email interview received last June 28, 2005, Monday.
Part I. Your Opinion
1. Andrew: Why do you write poetry?
Rhina: Because I've loved poetry from childhood, and writing it feels as natural as walking.
2. Andrew: Are poetry books difficult to sell? If yes, why?
Rhina: No, it's just that the audience for poetry is smaller than for fiction, say, or some kinds of non-fiction. But that small audience that always exists for poetry does buy books and attend poetry readings. I think it's growing right now, too, although it will probably never be as large as the readership for prose, especially popular fiction. Poets are used to that.
3. Andrew: Have you been invited before to judge poetry contests? If yes, is it difficult or a wonderful experience?
Rhina: Yes, I've judged quite a few contests, and find it interesting. Whether it's "wonderful" or not depends on the quality of the entries, of course, and those vary widely from contest to contest.
4. Andrew: What advice can you give to amateur poets to be a poetry award winner like you?
Rhina: Read a lot, both from the past and from the present, and note those poems that please and move you and what it is about them that makes them work. Learn the craft: poetry is an art, like painting or dancing or composing music or playing an instrument, and there is a great deal of craft involved, not simply thought or vivid images. The use of language is as important for a poet as the use of line and color for a painter. Beginning poets should not be fooled into thinking there's nothing to learn simply because language is what we use to speak with every day: it has to be used with greater economy, more conscious artistry and attention to sound and connotation, when you use it to write poems than when you speak on the phone or compose a casual note.
5. AA: Do you like to travel? If yes, what countries have you visited so far?
RE: Yes, we've traveled a bit, to England, Spain, France, Italy, Greece, Sicily, Portugal and Latin America, as well as Canada, and we camped all over the U. S. when we were younger and our sons were still with us. We travel much less now, but still enjoy it.
6. AA: Have you reached the peak of your poetic career? Why?
RE: I have no way of knowing that. Critics and readers make that kind of determination, after the fact, not authors while they're still writing.
7. AA: Some people consider "prose poetry" not a poem but more of a prose. What do you think of prose poetry? Should we classify "prose poetry" as poetry? Defend your answer.
RE: If you mean "Is there poetry that is not written in verse," yes, I think there is. Some of it is very good, and some of it is dreadful, and the rest is in-betweeen, which is also true of poetry written in verse. The danger of "prose poetry" is that many beginning poets think it's going to be easy to write, so they're tempted by it, but actually it's every bit as hard to write well as metrical poetry, and even easier to write badly, because it encourages long, windy, unmusical passages. The advantage of formal limits is the fact that they keep the writer on his toes, and force him to think and rethink imaginatively , instead of being too easily satisfied with what goes down on the paper first. Being made to slow down and rethink things and work at them is a tremendous advantage to any artist, in any field. The mind works better under pressure, and surprises itself - thereby surprising the reader too.
8. AA: Have you written your best poetrybook? If yes, what is your best poetrybook so far? Why?
RE: See reply to question #6.
9. AA: What is the latest poetry book (not your book) you have read?
RE: The Green Maces of Autumn, by Lewis Turco, and it's a real beauty.
10. AA: Should teen-agers be encouraged to read poetry? Why?
RE: Yes, everyone should be encouraged to read poetry, because it's one of the great pleasures of life, like all of the arts. It also enriches the mind and enlarges one's life, but it shouldn't be offered to readers as something that's "good for them", like vitamins. It should be offered as what it is: a physical joy with emotional dimensions, like dancing.
11.AA: Is poetry a dying art? If no, If yes, why?
RE: No, it's not dying at all. It's built into the wiring of our brains, like singing and dancing and every other natural human pleasure. Unfortunately it's been mislabeled as philosophy or self-improvement or some other form of vitamin for so long that several generations grew up not knowing that it's as elemental and joyous as sex or good food, but it is. That doesn't mean that it turns out well automatically just because of the enthusiasm involved: even the most enthusiastic cook needs to know something about cooking, about what different spices and processes will do to the raw ingredients. That's where knowledge of the craft comes in, again.
12.AA: Have you written a single poem with 100 or more stanzas? If yes, what is the title?
RE: No.
1. AA: Were you interviewed in a literary e-zine or magazine or newspaper before?
RE: Yes
AA: If Yes, can you name the literary mags which interviewed you?
RE: A great many papers and mags have interviewed me over the years, beginning with "The NY Sun" and "Seventeen" when I was still in high school and began publishing poems. I can't possibly list them, but the most recent interview was this year, in "The Wire," a NH publication.
AA: If yes, when or what year?
RE: 2005
2. AA: Were you featured/interviewed in television shows?
RE: Yes
AA: If Yes, what TV program?
RE: Several, but most recently for "Write Right Now," on Haverhill Community TV, in December 2004. That show was aired this spring, and will probably be repeated.
AA: If Yes, when or what year?
RE: See above.
3. AA: Were you featured/interviewed in a radio before?
RE: Yes
AA: If yes, what radiostation?
RE: I don't recall the station or the date, but the program is called "Poet to Poet" and airs in NYC.
AA: If yes, what date or what year?
RE: I don't recall; during the mid-nineties, I think.
4. AA: Is "The Shadow I Dress In " your first poetrybook?
RE: No.
AA: If No, what are the titles of your previous poetry chapbooks and poetrybooks ?
RE: I have three chapbooks:"Mundo y Palabra/The World & The Word," "RPE: Greatest Hits 1942-2001," and "The Story-teller's Hour." I also have five full-length books: "Lapsing to Grace", "Where Horizons Go", "Rehearsing Absence", "The Shadow I Dress In" and "Playing at Stillness", my most recent one.
5. AA: How many pieces of the poetrybook "The Shadow I Dress In" have you sold so far?
If you don't mind answering the question. ( You may skip the question if you don't like to answer this question.)
RE: I don't keep track of the copies of any book sold; it's the publishers who do that.
6. AA: What age did you start writing poetry?
RE: I started writing poems very early in childhood.
7. AA: At what age did you start writing poems seriously?
RE: During adolescence.
8. AA: Who encouraged you to write poetry?
RE: My poet grandmother, first, and other members of my family, and then my teachers._I was lucky enough to be in some wonderful NYC schools during the 1930s, 1940s, 1950s and 1960s, and had devoted, enthusiastic, well-read teachers.
9. AA: Why do you write your poems in rhymed verse instead of free verse?
RE: That's the way they come to me, most of the time, and I love rhyme and meter for the music they create. Sometimes I write in syllabics, and occasionally in free verse, when a poem clearly wants to be written that way. But metrical rhymed verse is what comes to me most naturally.
10. AA: Who are your favorite dead poets ?
RE: Considering only poets who wrote in English, I'd say the great Elizabethans, and the Metaphysical Poets of the 17th century, especially George Herbert, and in the U. S, Emily Dickinson, Robert Frost and Stanley Kunitz.
AA: Why?
RE: Their poems speak to me and stay with me over the years, and continue to move and delight me.
11 . AA: Do you have a favorite living poet?
RE: Yes
AA: If yes, can you name the living poet?
RE: Richard Wilbur and X. J. Kennedy
AA: Why do you like this particular living poet?
RE: For the same reasons I love the dead ones.
12. AA: Who among the poets (dead/living) influenced you?
RE: All of those I've named, as well as Edna St. Vincent Millay and Anthony Hecht.
13. AA: What awards have you received related to poetry?
RE: Two Howard Nemerov Awards, three of the annual prizes from the Poetry Society of America, The Oberon Prize, the T. S. Eliot Prize for Poetry, the Richard Wilbur Award, the Stanzas Prize, the Sparrow Sonnet Award, the National Poetry Book Award, among others.
14. AA: In your opinion, why is it big publishing firms do not accept poetrybook manuscripts from new poets?
RE: I don't know if that's generally true.
15 AA: Is self-publishing the best path for firstbook poets? If yes, why?
RE: No. It's better to enter the risky competition involved in submitting work to publishers, magazines and anthologies, and know that when your work is published it has the backing of the outfit that chose it for publication, and not just your own. That earns more respect from readers, and gets you more help with distribution, too.
16. AA: Is your poetrybook -self-published or published by a big publishing company?
RE: I've never self-published. My manuscripts have either been requested by publishers, accepted in competition, or won prizes that involved publication as well as a cash award.
17 .AA: Do you write other literary genre? Check if Yes. Check as many as applicable.
RE: A. short stories: Yes B. novellas_____ C. novels _____D. essays: Yes E. plays ____ F. nonfiction _____
18. AA: Which of your literary works were published?
RE: A. Short stories: Yes B. novellas ____ C. novels _____ D. essays: Yes E. plays___ F. Non-fiction________
19. AA: Have you made bookreviews before?
RE: Yes
20. AA: Have you published books that is not a poetrybook?
RE: No
21. AA: When did you publish your first full-length poetrybook?
RE: My first full-length poetry book appeared in 1992.
22. AA: Did you contribute literary articles (poems, short fiction, essays, etc.) to middle school-based or college-based newspapers, community newspapers?
RE: I sometimes publish essays in community newspapers and weeklies
23. AA: What is your favorite poem while in Middle School ? College? Why?
RE: Doesn't apply, since I'm not a high school or college student.
24. AA: What are your favorite hobbies/recreation aside from reading poetry?
RE: I enjoy music, art, drama and dance performances, and read fiction and other prose.
25. AA: Are you single or married or divorced or widowed or remarried?
RE: Married
AA: If married, what is the name of your husband?
RE: Alfred Moskowitz
AA: If married, how many children?
RE: 3 sons
26. AA: Have you acted in Shakespeare plays or any theater plays?
The complete interview with Rhina Espaillat will be available in the print edition of Muses Review.
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