Author-To-Author: Contemporary Poets; Author-To-Author: First Novelists

Author George Garrett is the host for this informal interview series which focuses on contemporary writers. Contemporary Poets features poets Rita Dove, Elizabeth Spires, and Henry Taylor reading and discussing their own work as well as examining the perennially fragile health of poetry in modern America. Garrett and his guests explore the evolution of poetry, the mechanics of writing poetry, and the felicitous combination of both language and sound which make great poetry such a rewarding experience. Recognizing that the shelf space devoted to poetry in the bookstore chains continues to shrink, the interviewees make a good case for both the increasing diversity of modern American verse, and its continuing relevance to our lives. In First Novelists, Garrett talks with three new writers: Sydney Blair, Cathryn Hankla and Darcey Steinke. Garett, the veteran, knows precisely what questions run through the minds of both readers and beginning writers, and therefore queries his guests on the subjects of autobiography in first novels, the circumstances surrounding the acceptance of their books (Steinke's story of her phone call from Doubleday editor Jacqueline Onassis is charming), and the so-called "second-novel jinx." Serious readers and budding writers alike will enjoy these intimate portraits of the artist. Colleges with strong writing programs will certainly want to consider these, as will public libraries with substantial literary criticism collections. Other titles in the Author-to-Author series are: The Fiction of Mary Lee Settle, Contemporary Short-Story Writers, and The Modernist Movement in Poetry. (Available from: Omnigraphics Inc., Penobscot Bldg., Detroit, MI 48226; 1-800-234-1340.)