CORRECTIONS APPENDED Every industry has its high honors: actors have the Oscars, musicians have the Grammys, and Hef’s Bunnies have
By Gulus Emre
Feb 24, 2009
CORRECTIONS APPENDED
Every industry has its high honors: actors have the Oscars, musicians have the Grammys, and Hef’s Bunnies have Playmate of the Year. For the Harvard literati, one of the highest honors is the Briggs-Copeland lectureship: a five-year teaching position given to authors and teachers of English. Last Thursday, Lecturers Joanna G. Klink and Peter Richards showcased their work in the First Annual Briggs-Copeland Poetry Reading at Houghton Library.
“I had always heard about the Briggs-Copeland lectureships—they’re pre-eminent,” said Christina S. Davis, the curator of the George Edward Woodberry Poetry Room and organizer of the event. “I felt like to anchor my season, I wanted to begin by honoring them.”
The reading drew an eclectic crowd: students rubbed elbows with English Department fixtures, who greeted each other with hugs and air kisses.
“I’m really excited to be here,” said Liza D. Flum ’10. “I’ve had exciting classes with both Joanna and Peter, but I’ve never heard either of them read.”
The readers, despite their vastly different styles, kept their audience rapt with attention.
“[Klink] is so present when she reads her work that you feel like she’s thinking it and speaking it for the first time,” said Christine P. Brown, a former student of Klink’s at the University of Montana.
While Klink introduced a transcendent atmosphere into the normally austere Edison and Newman Room, causing her audience to bow their heads and close their eyes in meditation, she remained modest about her performance.
“I haven’t really thought about it, I just try not to look at the audience,” Klink said. “Not like Peter, he engages his audience.”
Richards kept his audience on its toes with jokes and a few grisly words sprinkled throughout his reading, such as “pug dog” and “prick”.
[SEE CORRECTION BELOW]
As Richards put it, a poetry reading with a bit of potty mouth is destined to be “great fun.” [SEE CORRECTION BELOW]
CORRECTIONS
The Feb. 26 magazine article “Reading With the Stars: Harvard Literati Step Out For Poetry” incorrectly stated that Briggs-Copeland Lecturer Peter Richards used the words “pug dog” in a lecture on Feb. 19. In fact, Richards used the word “pug,” not “pug dog.”
The article also incorrectly stated that Richards said poetry reading with a bit of potty mouth is destined to be “great fun.” In fact, Richards was referring to poetry reading in general and made no mention of foul language in reference to that remark.
