2008.07.11.ryan [music] Matt Raymond: Each year, thousands of book lovers of all ages visit the nation’s capital to celebrate the joys of reading and lifelong literacy at the National Book Festival, sponsored by the Library of Congress [Library], and hosted by first lady Laura Bush. Now in its eighth year, this free event, held on the National Mall Saturday, Sept. 27, will spark readers’ passion for learning as they interact with the nation’s best-selling authors, illustrators and poets. Even if you can’t attend the festival in person, you can participate online. These podcasts with well-known authors are available through the National Book Festival website; that’s www.loc.gov/bookfest. I’m Matt Raymond, coming to you from the Library of Congress, and I’m pleased to be joined by Kay Ryan. She is recently appointed by the Librarian of Congress as the new poet laureate of the United States, or the more specific title, Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry. She’s the 16th person to hold that title, and she’ll be joining us at the National Book Festival, as well as opening the Library’s literary season on October 16. A resident of Marin County, Calif., Ryan has carved out a unique niche in the poetry world with highly accessible poems, using what she calls “recombinant rhymes,” along with a healthy dose of wit, insight, and even puns. She has written six books of poetry and a limited edition artist’s book, along with a number of essays. Her latest book, “The Niagara River,” was published in 2005 by Grove Press. But she has also spent a great part of her life, more than 30 years, in fact, teaching remedial English part-time at the College of Marin in Kentfield, California. And we are absolutely delighted to have you with us. Thank you for making time, Ms. Ryan. Kay Ryan: Oh, the pleasure is mine. Matt Raymond: My first question: how does it feel to be the poet laureate? Kay Ryan: Well, it feels very strange. I mean, it’s sort of like I’ve been boiled, maybe a little too fast. You know, the old story about boiling a frog so gradually that it doesn’t know it got boiled? I’ve been living out of the spotlight for most of my life, and it’s a sudden – a very sudden elevation. Matt Raymond: How did you first become interested in poetry? Kay Ryan: You know, poetry really came and got me. I was always interested in language, just -- I was just bewitched as a child when anybody would say something special. I remember, I was in something like third grade and a girl said to me, “Don’t broadcast it.” And I thought, oh, what a devastating phrase. I’m going to use it myself. So, I was always very, very sensitive to language. But I really, only at the age of about 30, did I realize that I was just not going to be able to avoid really writing poetry as a lifetime occupation. I had resisted it. I loved reading it. I was an undergraduate and graduate student of literature. But I think that I hadn’t wanted to be a poet because I saw it as something that really required the whole self. It required a kind of exposure that seemed obnoxious to me. I didn’t want to be exposed in that way. I wanted to be funny, or I wanted to be more distant. So, I was reluctant to be something so all-exposing and innocence all-consuming as well. Matt Raymond: Now, were there people who told you to indeed broadcast it? I mean, were there some role models, or people who encouraged and inspired you as you were beginning your work? Kay Ryan: Well, of course, I was inspired by the masters of literature in English. I was very compelled by poetry in general, literature in general. It was thrilling. I went to community college, and I remember my very first English survey course. It was survey English and composition as well. And I remember being introduced to reading short stories, and understanding that they had a strong intellectual component, that they could be thought of as more than stories, that they’re working on a number of levels at once. And it was very exciting to my mind, which enjoyed work and enjoyed moving quickly. But I hadn’t really, somehow, understood literature so much as a brain stimulant. And as soon as I got that, I really became compelled by literature. Matt Raymond: Now, from everything that I’ve read and learned about you, you are unique. You’re not, I guess, very easily categorized, and you’ve really sort of, as I said earlier, carved out your own place. How would you describe your own style? Kay Ryan: Well, first of all, I’m going to go back to that word unique. I am convinced that every poet is unique and that, in fact, that is the very requirement of poetry: that if it is genuine, something has been said in a way that it hasn’t been said before. The subject matter is never unique. It’s loss or hope, or despair or love, or something of that sort. But it’s got to be unique. As to my writing, I think maybe one of the most distinguishing things about it, is that I discovered at a fairly early point in my writing development that I just adored rhyme. And yet I -- this was, say, in the 1970s, and rhyme was very frowned upon. So, I think I began insinuating it into my work in really strange ways. Not direct end rhyme, or not “shoe, blue, new, crew” sort of rhyme, but all sorts of hashing up of sounds and sticking them in funny places. So, I would say that the rhyming quality is very distinctive, and the kind of rhyme is distinctive in my work. Also, my poems are extremely short. They are sometimes called miniature, but I certainly don’t think they’re miniature. They’re just short. So, rhyme-y, strangely rhyme-y, and short, and maybe I would also add, really interested in the processes of the mind, and the exhilarations of the mind. And also, I think I would say playful. Matt Raymond: Now, I saw this phrase recombinant, recombinant – I’m having a hard time pronouncing it – “recombinant rhyme.” Is that the type of rhyme that you’re talking about? Kay Ryan: I made that term up a long time ago. I was thinking about, like, recombinant DNA, where you chop a bunch of DNA up and stick it together in different ways, and make purple ants or, you know, or glow-in-the-dark rhinoceri. And I take the sounds in words and, maybe, rematch them or off-match them in reverse in following words, or hash the syllables of one word up and redistribute it in several others later on. And it works, kind of, subliminally on people. You don’t really notice it so much right away, but then later you think, “Huh, what was that?” One time -- my brother is not a big reader of poetry, but he’s a nice brother, and I had a new book, and he dutifully sat down and read it front to back the way very few actual readers of poetry would do. And at the end, he looked up and he said, “You know,” he said, “When I was reading that, it didn’t seem to rhyme at all. But now, it seems like it all rhymed.” And I thought that was one of the greatest compliments I had ever had. Matt Raymond: Very subtle; it insinuates itself into you, I suppose. Kay Ryan: Well, I hope so. Sometimes, it’s very broad and pounds you over the head, and I like that. Matt Raymond: Well, this would seem a natural spot to ask if you’d like to read any of your work for us. Kay Ryan: Well, sure I would. I’m always glad to do that. And you know, I thought I would read a poem that has to do with -- well the title of the poem is “Limelight,” and that’s also another kind of thing I like to do, is take a word or a phrase like, say, limelight, that we know -- we know how we use it. It means to be the focus of attention. But to think about the phrase, limelight, and the reason I want to read this poem is because I suddenly find myself in the limelight. And this is a comment on the limelight. “Limelight” One can't work by lime light. A bowlful right at one's elbow produces no more than a baleful glow against the kitchen table. The fruit purveyor's whole unstable pyramid doesn't equal what daylight did. Matt Raymond: Are there any other works that you’d like to read for us? Kay Ryan: Oh, sure. How much time do you have? Matt Raymond: As much time as you’d like. Kay Ryan: I’m going to read you a poem called “Home to Roost.” And of course I’m thinking there of the phrase, “your chickens are coming home to roost.” And that’s always said to us in a very -- usually a kind of a smug and certainly minatory critical way, because there are never good chickens. They’re always chickens of bad decisions you make. So here’s that poem. “Home to Roost” The chickens are circling and blotting out the day. The sun is bright, but the chickens are in the way. Yes, the sky is dark with chickens, dense with them. They turn and then they turn again. These are the chickens you let loose one at a time and small— various breeds. Now they have come home to roost—all the same kind at the same speed. Matt Raymond: I would expect that your fans would get to hear more of your poetry at both the National Book Festival on the 27 of Sept., and the opening of the literary season on October 16. I know that you participated in the book festival in the past. Why do you feel it’s important to participate? Kay Ryan: Well, first of all, I would say that it’s, really, a lot of fun to do. It’s just great to see those white tents up all over the Mall, and people just swarming, and so excited and happy. I think it’s important to participate because books are such an exhilarating and central and liberating part of our country. It’s just a wonderful thing to say, “Hey, it’s book day.” I can’t think of anything that we can all agree upon more than the centrality of books in our mental lives. Matt Raymond: Why is poetry important? Kay Ryan: You know, that’s the kind of giant question one hopes one is never asked, but I will give it my best. Matt Raymond: [Laughs] Okay. Kay Ryan: I think -- I’m going to say, from my own point of view, that it’s the most secret, the most private form of communication in language. And that when I find a poet who means something to me, my first impulse is to keep my mouth shut, to keep it my secret. I think that poems are transmissions from the depths of whoever wrote them to the depths of the reader. And to a greater extent than, I think, with any other kind of reading, the reader of a poem is making that poem, is inhabiting those words, in the most personal sort of way. And that doesn’t mean that you read a poem and you just make it whatever you want to be. But that it goes so -- it’s operating so deeply in you that it is the most special, the most special kind of reading. Matt Raymond: When we think back over the history of poetry -- hundreds, if not thousands of years -- names like Shakespeare, and Keats, and Shelly, and Wordsworth, and Frost, do you think that people today are more or less in tune with poetry than we have been in the past? Kay Ryan: You know, I -- that’s the kind of question that I absolutely -- it doesn’t concern me. I don’t worry about it. I think of poetry as like money that you find on the ground, or money that’s been lost for a thousand years, or 2,000 years. It doesn’t matter when you find it. It’s valuable. It keeps all its value. It may have much more value. So, it can wait for us. And it doesn’t matter how many people, at any particular date, in any particular city, are looking at it. It can wait. And in my mind, it’s never in trouble. Matt Raymond: Have you ever received feedback from your fans that’s been especially moving or inspirational to you in any way? Kay Ryan: Well, I do find -- I do get feedback. It doesn’t seem to stick, though. Thank God. I mean, because you know, if you’re writing, you can’t write to correct what someone doesn’t like, and you certainly can’t write to repeat what they did like. So, I find it very gratifying to my animal self -- you know, we all like praise -- but I don’t find it in any way useful to my writing self. Matt Raymond: I’ve always been very interested in being able to talk with authors and poets, and find out how they approach their work individually. You know, sometimes there are idiosyncrasies or particular methods that they hew to. Are there special places that you do your writing or where you find your inspiration, or do you wake up in the middle of the night and scribble something down on a pad? Kay Ryan: Well, I, you know, I sometimes say that I don’t write in response to inspiration. I certainly don’t wait for inspiration. I find that I have to start, and rub some words together, and maybe they’ll get warm. You know, I’ll get a little spark from them. The inspiration comes after starting, for the most part. And I’m willing to start quite mechanically. There may be an idea of something that irritates me. I’ve just jotted a few words down. And just, then I would use those words as a title, maybe, and just try to get something going. And then, the beauty of writing poems for me is that I don’t do much thinking when I’m not writing. I have a strangely empty mind. And when I set myself to task, usually in the morning, and usually lying in bed with a yellow tablet and a pen, when I set myself to task of just starting to do some writing, not knowing at all what it will be, I gain access to my own mind in a way that I just don’t otherwise have it. So, the process itself of putting the pen to the paper, and beginning to use words in a -- in the most accurate way that I can, and the freest way that I can, sort of begins some kind of brain machinery that’s otherwise latent. Matt Raymond: Now, you’re also a teacher. And I think, again, that’s something that is fairly unique about you and your background, and being a well-rounded human being, I guess you could say. Kay Ryan: Well, I don’t know that I’m well-rounded. I think I’m probably pretty lopsided. But I think the thing that makes me unusual as a writer/teacher isn’t that I’m a teacher, because so many writers, by choice or requirement teach --particularly creative writing. But in my case, I have taught remedial English at a community college for -- well, over thirty years, although I’m actually not doing it this semester. And I would say that one of the main effects it’s had on me, I would guess, is that it has made me desperate to communicate simple things. You know, I mean, like, I might want to get across the objective case or something like that, or main ideas, or supporting details, or lord knows what -- how to use a semicolon. And I will reach, in desperation, for the wildest metaphor to bring across to my students some element of grammar or composition. Matt Raymond: This would also seem to be a natural place for me to ask if you have any advice that you would offer young people, or even older people -- my mother, for instance, has recently gotten into amateur poetry writing. What would you tell them, if they’re budding poets in their own right? Kay Ryan: Well, I want to say, first, it’s all amateur, you know? It’s all amateur. I don’t think that, whoever the poet, they ever believe that they’ve mastered it, and if they’re ever going to necessarily get one more poem that they can present to the world without shame. I would say, be disobedient. I would say, don’t be cowed. I would say, read a great deal -- read, read, read. And don’t necessarily read poetry. Read science, read philosophy, read the newspaper. Read murder mysteries. I would add and love language, and have the largest arsenal that you can possibly have. You don’t have to use it all, but you have it. Matt Raymond: Kay Ryan, the poet laureate of the United States. I always like to end these interviews by asking people what’s coming next for them. I have a feeling that the answer might be something of a whirlwind. Kay Ryan: What I’m going to be doing next? Matt Raymond: Yes. Kay Ryan: Actually, I don’t know. I expect all of this is going to descend on my head very shortly. But I just got back from a really nice run in the hills of Marin County, and I’m looking forward to doing the laundry now. Matt Raymond: [Laughs] Easy enough. Well, thank you very much, Ms. Ryan. [music] We’re excited to hear more from you at the National Book Festival, on Saturday, Sept. 27, on the National Mall, from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. The event is free and open to the public, and if you would like more details and a complete list of participating authors, you can visit www.loc.gov/bookfest. This is Matt Raymond from the Library of Congress. Thank you very much for listening. [end of transcript]