Learn more about Rukeyser’s experience at Moncada and her long-lost novel at Guernica:
It was Rukeyser’s first trip abroad. After a month in London, where she got the magazine assignment from the British editor, she left for Spain. But her train to Barcelona, carrying many People’s Olympiad athletes, was among the last to cross the border. It was stopped in the Catalonian town of Moncada. Rumors ran through the train until the town’s mayor appeared on a platform wearing a black ribbon of mourning, and solemnly informed all those listening that there had been the “deaths of men in this town today.”
Enjoy some contemporary Shakespeare for the Bard’s birthday.
You can read Sonnet XVIII (Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?) here, and learn more about Poetry Out Loud: National Recitation contest here. The National Finals of Poetry Out Loud take place next week in Washington, DC. The event is free and open to the public. Come and root for poetry! (Non-Washingtonians: there will also be a live webcast, and you can host your own viewing party!)
Pulitzer Prize winner Sharon Olds shares work from her winning collection, Stag’s Leap. Olds also talks with the NewsHour about her partner’s New Hampshire nature retreat where she spends her days, about finding her poetic voice in her 30s, and the “usefulness” of poetry.
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