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Poets on Poetry
The Uncertain Certainty: Interviews, Essays, and Notes on Poetry
Provides a critical and autobiographical context for viewing Simic's poetry
- GenresPoetryEssaysNonfiction
144 pages, Paperback
First published March 15, 1986
59 people want to read
About the author
Charles Simic
256 books472 followersU.S. Poet Laureate, 2007-2008
Dušan Charles Simic was born in Belgrade, former Yugoslavia, on May 9, 1938. Simic’s childhood was complicated by the events of World War II. He moved to Paris with his mother when he was 15; a year later, they joined his father in New York and then moved to Oak Park, a suburb of Chicago, where he graduated from the same high school as Ernest Hemingway. Simic attended the University of Chicago, working nights in an office at the Chicago Sun Times, but was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1961 and served until 1963.
Simic is the author of more than 30 poetry collections, including The World Doesn’t End: Prose Poems (1989), which received the Pulitzer Prize; Jackstraws (1999); Selected Poems: 1963-2003 (2004), which received the International Griffin Poetry Prize; and Scribbled in the Dark (2017). He is also an essayist, translator, editor, and professor emeritus of creative writing and literature at the University of New Hampshire, where he taught for over 30 years.
Simic has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, the Academy of American Poets, and the National Endowment for the Arts. His other honors and awards include the Frost Medal, the Wallace Stevens Award from the Academy of American Poets, and the PEN Translation Prize. He served as the 15th Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, and was elected as Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets in 2001. Simic has also been elected into the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
Dušan Charles Simic was born in Belgrade, former Yugoslavia, on May 9, 1938. Simic’s childhood was complicated by the events of World War II. He moved to Paris with his mother when he was 15; a year later, they joined his father in New York and then moved to Oak Park, a suburb of Chicago, where he graduated from the same high school as Ernest Hemingway. Simic attended the University of Chicago, working nights in an office at the Chicago Sun Times, but was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1961 and served until 1963.
Simic is the author of more than 30 poetry collections, including The World Doesn’t End: Prose Poems (1989), which received the Pulitzer Prize; Jackstraws (1999); Selected Poems: 1963-2003 (2004), which received the International Griffin Poetry Prize; and Scribbled in the Dark (2017). He is also an essayist, translator, editor, and professor emeritus of creative writing and literature at the University of New Hampshire, where he taught for over 30 years.
Simic has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, the Academy of American Poets, and the National Endowment for the Arts. His other honors and awards include the Frost Medal, the Wallace Stevens Award from the Academy of American Poets, and the PEN Translation Prize. He served as the 15th Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, and was elected as Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets in 2001. Simic has also been elected into the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
July 6, 2014
I really liked this little book. Simic’s thoughts on poetry and writing and the world are always challenging and insightful. While I have difficulty with understanding all he says - I follow enough of it to really delight in it. His perspective on the writing life is both not all that unusual for poets, and completely unusual in his content. And what an interesting biography (though The Orphan Factory touched on that more - it still resonates here). I look forward to reading more of his good work.
January 20, 2019
This was a terrific book -- even (in fact, especially) the interviews. Usually I have an aversion to such things, but Simic has such astute, beautiful (and often surprising) observations on all things poetry. It made me itch to get back to the computer and write! (For anyone who loves prose poems, read his fantastic book THE WORLD DOESN'T END.)
May 23, 2008
To read "A Retired School Teacher in Galoshes"- just the title...was almost worth the price of admission. Reading that one page essay made me feel that my $16.95 & reading time was well spent, invested and paid the lingering dividend that poetry provides.
Simic.
If you don't like poetry or claim that you don't get it...read Simic.
Simic.
If you don't like poetry or claim that you don't get it...read Simic.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews