“Canoeing” and “Georgic” by Dara Mandle
Dara Mandle earned her BA in English from Yale, where she was awarded the Clapp Poetry Prize, and her MFA in poetry from Columbia. Her poems have appeared in Brooklyn Review, Painted… Read More
From the Vault! Ernest Hilbert’s Introduction to Classic Tales of Horror, Issued in the Canterbury Classics Series
Ernest Hilbert provides a comprehensive introduction to this new popular edition of the classic horror stories, spanning the century between Polydori’s groundbreaking 1819 short novel Vampyre and early twentieth-century classics by H.P.… Read More
“Poem Begun on the Autumn Equinox” by Ernest Hilbert
"The American lyric rendered in these poems follows Coleridge’s description of the sonnet as 'adapted to the state of a man violently agitated by a real passion.' Hilbert’s passion here is… Read More
“Warning” by A.M. Juster
"This is one of those rare occasions when both the original and the imitation are sui generis—like Jackie Gleason and Fred Flintstone!" - Alfred Nicol… Read More
“The Evil One” by Håkan Sandell, Translated from the Swedish by Bill Coyle
Bill Coyle's poems and translations have appeared in journals including the Hudson Review, PN Review and Poetry. His first book of poetry, The God of This World to His Prophet, won the… Read More
“Funtime” by Iggy Pop and David Bowie, Live on Dinah Shore, 1977
Watch Iggy go nuts on live TV while a cool kapellmeister Bowie supervises. … Read More
“The Green Man” by Jim Harrison
”Mr. Harrison’s novels and poems over the last two decades have been increasingly preoccupied with mortality, never so much as in Dead Man’s Float, his very good new book of verse. Here… Read More
Susan Spear’s Opera The Price of Pomegranates, Now with Video!
Poet and librettist Susan Spear studied with me in 2012, when I began teaching a course on the practical art of the opera libretto for the Western MFA poetry concentration. She began… Read More
Ernest Hilbert Bowdlerized at Long Last!
Until now, my poems have appeared whole or in parts, but not intentionally altered. At last, I am proud to have been slightly bowdlerized! … Read More
The Tiny Viking Drinking Horn of Ernest Hilbert the Rooster!
As noted here in years past, there is, in fact, a venerable warlord rooster named Ernest Hilbert, who keeps watch over his realm and his harem in Massachusetts. He was named for… Read More
“Dream Song 207” by John Berryman
“Berryman has written an elegy on his brilliant generation and, in the process, he has also written an elegy on himself.” - A. Alvarez… Read More
Shearwater covers David Bowie’s “Look Back In Anger”
"Since springing from the rib of Okkervil River, Shearwater has always made music bigger than the capacity of the clubs they play . . . Meiburg seems to be personally willing the… Read More
“The Dogdays” by J.V. Cunningham
“Cunningham's (1911-1985) precisely bitter epigrams deserve more admirers. Like Ben Jonson's, Cunningham's best lines often state his moral or stylistic goals: ‘The classic indignation, / The sullen clarity / Of passions in… Read More
“My Father’s Dante” by Ernest Hilbert
"Ernest Hilbert is known for the sonnet, and rightfully so. In Caligulan, he doesn’t so much break free of that but makes it clear that whatever he does, whether with subject, verse… Read More
“Dog Days (Caniculares Dies)” by Ernest Hilbert
In his debut collection, Sixty Sonnets, Hilbert establishes a variation on the sonnet form, employing an intricate rhyme scheme and varied line length. A skillful practitioner of form and nuance, Hilbert shifts… Read More
“Light Illumined” by Ernest Hilbert
"As anti-pastoral as Hilbert can be, he shares Robert Frost’s commitment to describing impressions as precisely as possible, which may offer, as it did Robert Frost, a 'momentary stay against confusion,' even… Read More
“On the Vanity of Earthly Greatness” by Arthur Guiterman
Arthur Guiterman was born of American parents in Vienna, graduated from the College of the City of New York in 1891, and was married in 1909 to Vida Lindo. He was an… Read More
Caligulan Lands in London and London Takes a Bite Out of It
Through the kind ministrations of noted bookseller and celebrated poet John Clegg, the London Review Bookshop (LRB) in London is now plentifully stocked with copies of my latest venture, Caligulan. … Read More
“New Jersey” by BJ Ward
"In poems that both honor and transcend his blue-collar roots, BJ Ward blends poignancy and humor with downright good storytelling, and takes his place among the bright up-and-coming voices of his generation."… Read More
“Kite” by Ernest Hilbert Scored for Voice and Cello by Christopher LaRosa
Follow along with the score as you listen to Chris LaRosa's setting of my poem "Kite" for voice and cello, featured on ContemporaryCompositionXX's youtube channel, performed by Rachel Mikol and Will Rowe,… Read More
“I, Too, have Been to the Huntington” by J.V. Cunningham
[Cunningham's poems] "difficult as they are to place in the stream of American and English poetry, are of unusual interest. They are the products of a talent which is emphatically and avowedly… Read More
“Summer Scream” by Ernest Hilbert in the New Issue of Per Contra
My light-hearted summer "horror" poem "Summer Scream" appears in the new issue of Per Contra, an international journal of the arts, literature, and ideas.… Read More
Images of The Book Collector, a New Opera by Composer Stella Sung and Librettist Ernest Hilbert
Until now, I've only been able to share images taken on cell phones and smaller cameras, which you may have seen here. I've finally received some of the professional photographs taken of… Read More
“From the Balcony on Heavy Metal Tribute Night at the Trocadero” by Ernest Hilbert
"Per Contra began publication as an online quarterly in the fall of 2005. Our name indicates our intention to offer more than one way of looking at the world. You can… Read More
“dirty martini” by Ryan Eckes
"Ryan Eckes' VALU-PLUS continues his incisive, wry, sincere, & gorgeous examination of the city- landscape. In Eckes' work, the city—Philadelphia, specifically—cannot be contained, but is well lived in & observed & explored.… Read More
Ernest Hilbert and Stella Sung’s New Opera, The Book Collector, to Premiere Friday, May 20th
My second opera with composer Stella Sung, The Book Collector, will be performed by the Dayton Opera on Friday, May 20th, with a matinee on Sunday May 22nd. The opera incorporates physical… Read More
Making a Modern Opera: Behind the Scenes of the Adaptation of The Scarlet Letter by Composer Lori Laitman and Librettist Dave Mason
"Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter is America’s first great tragic novel. Published in 1850, the work immediately caught the country’s attention and has never lost its grip. The story could easily be… Read More
“Blustery” by Neil Shepard
Neil Shepard’s sixth and seventh books of poetry were published in 2015: Hominid Up, by Salmon Poetry (Ireland), and Vermont Exit Ramps II (poems and photos) by Green Writers Press (Vermont).… Read More
“Dream Song 105” by John Berryman
“A major achievement . . . [Berryman] has written an elegy on his brilliant generation and, in the process, he has also written an elegy on himself.” - A. Alvarez, The Observer… Read More
John Betjeman Interviews Philip Larkin in a 1964 Episode of the British Television Program Monitor
John Betjeman interviewing Philip Larkin in a 1964 episode of Monitor, which was a flagship arts program on British TV during the 1950s and 1960s. Larkin reads "Church Going," "Toads Revisited," and… Read More