Essential American Poets

Poetry Foundation

4.3 (75)
PERFORMING ARTS

Listen to Donald Hall's selection of classic American poets reading from their work. These recordings are being made available as the result of a collaboration between US and UK poet laureates Donald Hall and Andrew Motion.

03/14/2012

Lorine Niedecker: Essential American Poets

Recordings of poet Lorine Niedecker with an introduction to her life and work. Recorded at home in 1970. Recording courtesy of PennSound.

16 min
01/25/2012

Gertrude Stein: Essential American Poets

Recordings of poet Gertrude Stein, with an introduction to her life and work. Recorded in 1934. Recording courtesy of PennSound.

17 min
01/04/2012

Charles Simic: Essential American Poets

Recordings of former poet laureate Charles Simic, with an introduction to his life and work. Recorded 2003, Key West, FL.

11 min
12/14/2011

Alan Dugan: Essential American Poets

Recordings of poet Alan Dugan, with an introduction to his life and work. Recorded in 1962, New York City, New York. Need a transcript of this episode? Request a transcript here.

12 min
11/30/2011

Gary Snyder: Essential American Poets

Recordings of poet Gary Snyder, with an introduction to his life and work. Recorded in 1966, Library of Congress, Washington DC. Need a transcript of this episode? Request a transcript here.

22 min
09/08/2011

Adrienne Rich: Essential American Poets

Recordings of poet Adrienne Rich, with an introduction to her life and work. Recorded in 2002 at the Audio Workshop in London

7 min
08/24/2011

Richard Hugo: Essential American Poets

Recordings of poet Richard Hugo, with an introduction to his life and work. Recorded in 1975, Library of Congress, Washington DC. Need a transcript of this episode? Request a transcript here.

14 min
08/10/2011

Robert Pinsky: Essential American Poets

Recordings of former poet laureate Robert Pinsky, with an introduction to his life and work. Recorded in 2007, in studio, Boston, MA.

29 min

See All (79)

4.3

out of 5

75 Ratings

Where is _____?

12/02/2022

MJW511

Though I do enjoy this, I have to wonder where a lot of poets are. There are some pretty glaring omissions. Notably, Langston Hughes.
One of the better poetry podcasts available

05/10/2012

Elizabeth_Costello

"Essential American Poets" offers one of the better poetry podcasts available, offering a range of major American poets free of charge. At first the list of poets was too narrow and mostly male, but over the last year the Poetry Foundation has offered a much richer slice of poets former Poet Laureate Donald Hall deemed "essential." Some podcasts are better than others: clearer, longer, with a range of the poet's work. Some are too brief. But you get a very good sampling nevertheless. I wish the Poetry Foundation would leave up all the podcasts, though, becomes some of the initial ones are no longer available. Having only 25 available means that if someone happens upon these podcasts at a certain point, they may miss some of the amazing poets (Lucille Clifton, John Ashbery, etc.) who have already posted. Also, given the foundation's resources it would be great if it would update the poets a bit more. Nevertheless, it's a great resource for lovers of poetry. If you never got to hear the great Adrienne Rich, who recently passed away, read her poetry live, you can hear it here.
Lovely

05/13/2022

Ejawesome22

15 minutes of contemplation and joy with every episode. A pause that refreshes!
Good Luck in Cracked Italian

07/19/2018

madam ripstitch

I listen to these shows like lullabies, like lilting lectures from a friend. I love the narrator’s voice, and the structure of the episodes: short bio of the poet followed by archival recordings of the poet reading their own work. My favorite podcast ever

Listen to Donald Hall's selection of classic American poets reading from their work. These recordings are being made available as the result of a collaboration between US and UK poet laureates Donald Hall and Andrew Motion.