Saturday, January 21, 2012

Don Wentworth: an Interview, by Christien Gholson


If you'd like to know what it was (& continues to be) like to edit a small press poetry magazine (Lilliput Review) for 22 years and then publish your first book at age, well, old ... this is the place:

Christien Gholson's noise & silence

Christien, a long time favorite poet and, now, novelist, managed to ask all the right questions that elicited responses which informed me about my own work.  Usually it is the interviewer that is grateful; in this case it is the interviewee. 

To complement the interview, here's a review of William Hart's Home to Ballygunge: Kolkota Tanka I did recently for simply haiku.



all of a sudden
he shuts up...
crow
Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue





best,
Don



Send a single haiku for the Wednesday Haiku feature. Here's how.

Go to the LitRock web site for a list of all 127 songs

14 comments:

Peter Newton said...

Don,

Great interview. Very insightful. The Lilliput Review works on so many levels and now even more.

Best, Peter

Grant Hackett said...

Don, You are most marvelous! Grant

Issa's Untidy Hut said...

Peter:

Thanks for the kind words. I'm very appreciative.

Grant:

Cheers! You are the marvel.

Don

Chen-ou Liu, 劉鎮歐 said...

Don, great interview, indeed.

As a struggling haiku poet, I was deeply moved by your following poems:

"Stop counting syllables, / start counting the dead."

Focus group --
the sky, the mountains,
the sea.


And as a student of philosophy, I was greatly enlightened by the following poem and your reflection on it

Spider puts me gently
in his little box, takes me
back inside.

Many thanks for sharing your work and wonderful thoughts.

Chen-ou

Issa's Untidy Hut said...

Chen-ou:

You are very kind, indeed. I appreciate your words more than I can say.

Don

snowbird said...

Don, Your descriptions of editing a journal are fascinating to me...who found that writing a book itself so daunting .... I know what it takes to make it "live"...

I also want to thank you for Wayne Hogan's drawings again... I've always enjoyed them...even way back as the journals took us on different paths. I've always wanted to "see" the natural world, and Wayne always wanted to show us what we all looked like inside! :-) Thanks, Merrill

TC said...

Don,

Great interview.

Particularly the bits about direct address and poking fun at oneself.

Keys to the kingdom!

Rick.Daddario said...

wow, oh wow. a treat to read, mahalo Don.*

*there is a longer version to this comment. I just wanted to leave a mark here. someday (like when I grow up) I'll send the longer version.

with laughter and glee, wow, oh wow - r

Issa's Untidy Hut said...

Merrill:

So happy you enjoyed it and that you mentioned the wonderful artist, Wayne Hogan, who perfect eye and offset humor I find at once endearing and philosophically spot-on.

Issa's Untidy Hut said...

Tom - a deep bow, in all directions ...

Issa's Untidy Hut said...

Rick, that's four wows an I'll take that on any scale, even 4 of 10 ...
sincerely appreciate your kind words.

Don

Anonymous said...

Dear Don Wentworth,

You are a compass to the four corners of both worlds. Would be lost without what you do. And, when your "Lillie" comes in the mail I literally stop. what I'm doing. Keep on. ~ Donna

Issa's Untidy Hut said...

Donna, you are very kind - cheers, Don

Rick.Daddario said...

yeah, I think the scale is 1 to 3 Don. wow on - aloha.