Peter Cochran
Dr Peter Cochran was born in Edinburgh and raised in Ipswich, Suffolk. He was an actor for nine years and a teacher of English and Drama for twenty-five. He is now editor of the Newstead Abbey Byron Society Review. He has lectured on Byron in London, Oxford, Cambridge, Newstead, Glasgow, Liverpool, Versailles, Salzburg, Yerevan and New York, and published numerous articles on the poet. He is author of the Byron entry in the New Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature, and of the entries on J.C.Hobhouse and E.J.Trelawny for the new DNB, and has recently published an edition of Michael Rees’s translation of Teresa Guiccioli’s Lord Byron’s Life in Italy. His interest in Robert Bloomfield is of late cultivation.
Dorianne Laux
Dorianne Laux is the author of three collections of poetry from BOA Editions, Awake (1990), introduced by Philip Levine, What We Carry (1994), finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, and Smoke (2000). She is also co-author, with Kim Addonizio, of The Poet's Companion: A Guide to the Pleasures of Writing Poetry (W.W. Norton, 1997). Recent work has appeared in The Best American Poetry, The American Poetry Review, Shenandoah, Ploughshares Barrow Street and Five Points. Among her awards are a Pushcart Prize for poetry, two fellowships from The National Endowment for the Arts and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Laux is an Associate Professor and works at the University of Oregon's Creative Writing Program.
Email: Dorianne Laux
Portrait sketch by Michael Kopacz from the photograph by Kim Addonizio
Gwendolyn MacEwen
Born in 1941 in Toronto, Canada, Gwendolyn MacEwen’s writings include fifteen books of poetry, two novels, a collection of short stories, a travel book, drama for radio and theater, translations, and children’s fiction. Her work has appeared in most Canadian literary publications and is represented in most Canadian anthologies. She has received the A.J.M. Smith Poetry Prize and was twice awarded the Governor General's Award. She died in November of 1987.
MacEwen was, in the purest sense, a mystic; a visionary writer years ahead of her time. A categorical list of her accomplishments thus falls sadly short when it comes to attempting an understanding of MacEwen or her work. She is best understood in her own words.
There is no key to this place and, in a sense, no door. There is free passage in and out.
Granted by permission of Robert Sward, an interview with Gwendolyn MacEwen regarding a subject MacEwen understood perhaps better than any other writer of the 20th century- spirituality: Read "Creators and their Source"; Excerpted from Robert Sward's Radio Feature, Spiritual Poetry
The information provided here is by permission of Carol Wilson, executor for The Estate of Gwendolyn MacEwen.
Carol Wilson, wilsoncarwil@aol.com
108 Burton Avenue, Apt. 201
Barrie, Ontario
Canada L4N 2R8
Frank Stanford
Called "the best poet in America under the age of thirty-five", on June 3rd, 1978, Frank Stanford shot himself three times with a .22 revolver. He was twenty-nine years old. What follows is a selection of his poetry, letters and essays about him from a variety of sources. These pages could not have been created without the invaluable assistance of Ginny Stanford and numerous friends. We are profoundly grateful. (and a very special thank-you to "Watson")
These poems originally appeared in the following publications,
to whom acknowledgement is here made; Ark River Review, La Bell Et La Bete (France),
Boston After Dark, Boston Phoenix, The Circular Ruins (Scotland),
Dacota Territory, Field, Hollins Critic, The Iowa Review, Ironwood, The Little Review,
The Mill Mountain Review, The New York Quarterly, Poetry, Australia, Prairie Schooner,
Road Apple Review, Stinktree, West Coast Poetry Review.
Note: The poems in this section were originally a part of the following manuscripts:
Gone, Field Talk, Shade, Approacheth the Ship and Wonder, Yonder, Saint Francis and the Wolf,
Some Poems 1957 - 1964, Blue Yodels, Automatic Co-Pilot, The Pre-Raphaelites Little Brother,
Naegling, Lord Gigolo and the Dancers With Chinese Eyes.
The sweet dark warmth of the whole world will have to be my wife.
—Thomas Merton
These poems originally appeared in the following publications,
to whom acknowledgement is here made: Boston After Dark, Boston Phoenix, La Notte (Italy)
Note: The poems in this section were originally a part
of the following manuscripts: Field Talk, 1957-1972; Blue Yodels
O go home, brother, go home!
The devil's back again,
amd magic Hell is swallowing flies
—Thomas Merton
These poems originally appeared in the following publications,
to whom acknowledgement is here made; Ark River Review, Dacotah Territory,
The Hunchback in the Park (Wales), Ghost Ship (Ireland),
The Mill Mountain Review.
Note: These poems were written during the time 1964 - 1968 and were originally
a part of the following manuscripts: Hard Figuring, So Long For This World,
Blue Yodels, Touched Stones, Taking My Shade.
I too have slept all night in that stolen Cadillac
—Thomas Merton
These poems originally appeared in the following publications,
to whom acknowledgement is here made:
Ask The Poet, De Quincy (England), Stinktree, Village.
Note: The title of the last poem in this book comes from a line by Borges.
The title Manao tupapau has two meanings:
the young girl can be thinking of the ghost,
or the ghost is thinking about her.
—Paul Gaugin
Grateful acknowledgement is made to the following magazines
in which some of these poems first appeared:
Barataria, Field, Ironwood, Out There and Seems.
"Death and the Arkansas River" also appears in Constant Stranger, (Mill Mountain Press).
It is included in the anthology, Fifty Contemporary Poets: The Creative Process, edited by Alberta Turner, David McKay Company, Inc., New York
For The Dead: Pier Paolo Pasolini & Rahshann Roland Kirk
And the Living: Muhammad Ali & Pharaoh Saunders
One's country is a group of rivers that flow into the sea.
The sea that is death. There you are ... to die for one's country.
—Luis Bunuel
Frank was an eager subject for my camera. I often worked at his direction. The following photographs were taken in Eureka Springs, Fayetteville and Subiaco, Arkansas. My thanks to Richard Banks, Jimbo Reynolds, Sherman and Minerva Morgan, Mr. Benny, James Diffenbaugh, Miss Angie Reynolds, Brother Jerry, OSB; Brother Michael, OSB; Brother Tobias, OSB; Father Nicholas Fuhrmann, OSB; and those whose names I can't remember, for being part of our lives.
I'm grateful to David Weems of Newtonia, MO for his long ago kindness and for first showing me how to take a picture; to Bruce & Mary Vaughan of Springdale, AR for their generosity and friendship, and for the Nikon they bestowed on me; and to Pierre from Photoworks in Santa Rosa, CA, for his artistry and sensitivity.
—Ginny Stanford
An Arkansas Album
All paintings by Ginny Stanford
Notice: Works published here may not be reproduced, electronically or otherwise, without prior consent of the authors or their agents. Some works have been licensed solely for use by The Alsop Review. Enquiries should be directed to the editors.
Robert Sward
Guggenheim award-winner Robert Sward teaches at UC Extension in Santa Cruz.
Chosen by Lucille Clifton to receive a Villa Montalvo Literary Arts Award, he is the author of 16 books including Four Incarnations, New & Selected Poems (Coffee House Press). Contributing Editor to the eZine Blue Moon Review he has just completed a new book, Rosicrucian in the Basement / Selected Poems, (Black Moss Press, Canada).
Other work by Robert is available at RobertSward.com.
Email: Robert Sward
Further Reading
J. Michael Yates
Born in Missouri, and raised in the USA, Germany, and Mexico, J. Michael Yates moved to Canada in 1966 after completing his doctorate in comparative literature at the University of Michigan.
He has taught literature and creative writing at the universities of Ohio, Alaska, British Columbia, and Texas and is the founder of the B.C. publishing houses Sono Nis and Cacanadadada. He is the author of twenty-six books of poetry and short fiction and has won many awards for his writing, including the Writer's Choice Award in 1988.
A former CBC executive, J. Michael Yates currently lives in Squamish, B.C.
Email J. Michael Yates
Notice: Works published here may not be reproduced, electronically or otherwise, without prior consent of the authors or their agents. Some works have been licensed solely for use by The Alsop Review. Enquiries should be directed to the editors.
