"Michigan is blessed with an awful lot of great writers, I think, and more good writers than pages to publish them in, and anybody who spends any length of time in Michigan will figure that out quickly."
TL, 1/22/02

The inaugural Featured Writer for Michigan Writers Network is internationally renowned poet and essayist Thomas Lynch. Author of The Undertaking, Bodies in Motion and at Rest and Still Life in Milford, Lynch has recently won the American Book Award.  On Tuesday, January 22nd, Lynch joined us at Michigan State University; we discussed his work and the craft of writing, and he graciously recited the three poems that we present here.

"Poetry ... beckons through the ear, it wants to be a heard thing, even more than it wants to be understood. It wants to be apprehended out there ... in the air..." TL, 1/22/02

Visit Thomas Lynch's Home Page at:
http://www.previewport.com/Home/lynch.html

Throughout our discussion, the writer was forthcoming about his own work and his current project, a book of essays about Ireland. In the excerpts presented below, Lynch discusses the concept of being a "Michigan Writer" or "Undertaker-Poet," and goes on to share his thoughts on the teaching of creative writing.

Click here for a multimedia presentation of Lynch reciting three poems,"Grimalkin," "The Hammock," and "Iambs for the Day of Burial," all taken from his 1998 collection, Still Life in Milford
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EXCERPTS FROM THE INTERVIEW:
Audio with synchronized transcripts
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Part 1: The Writing Process
Part 2: On being a Michigan Writer
Part 3: On being an "Undertaker-Poet"
Part 4: Reading Poetry
Part 5: Teaching Writers

Audio only--requires Quicktime Player
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Part 1: The Writing Process
Part 2: On being a Michigan Writer
Part 3: On being an "Undertaker-Poet"
Part 4: Reading Poetry
Part 5: Teaching Writers

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