Poet Kevin Young teaches 'to liberate all the voices'

The award-winning poet, teacher, and curator says that a book of poetry can change one's life.

from the April 17, 2007 edition

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"For the Confederate Dead" is a multitudinous collection, born of a poet who firmly believes that poetry, and the self, are "suffused" with many voices.

"The idea we have one voice is not true," says Young.

It's a principle he teaches his literature and writing students. "I'm trying to get them to liberate all the voices inside them."

In the classroom, Young draws from the Danowski collection, pulling out first editions of T.S. Eliot's "The Wasteland" and Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass."

He invites poets like Galway Kinnell and Rita Dove to read on campus and prints broadsides of their work. His advanced students even curate their own exhibits from the archives.

Above all, whether during National Poetry Month or any month of the year, Young sees his mission as keeping the poetic tradition moving forward. That means helping students to realize poetry is not the province of specialists nor is it dead.

"When I was growing up, I didn't know any living poets," says Young. "My job is to make sure [poetry] is alive and well and not something that's musty in the corner."

• Ethan Gilsdorf is a freelance writer based in Boston.

 

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