Poetry In America
Season 2
Scholar and host Elisa New travels the country, joining up with distinguished poets, celebrities, and everyday Americans to create a fully immersive experience in hearing, reading, and interpreting American poems.
Where to Watch Poetry In America • Season 2
8 Episodes
- Urban Love Poem, by Marilyn Chin
E1Urban Love Poem, by Marilyn ChinThe episode explores San Francisco's history from the Gold Rush and early Chinese immigration to the rise of Silicon Valley, through Marilyn Chin's "Urban Love Poem". In this series opener, host Elisa New brings together acclaimed memoirist Maxine Hong Kingston, tech investor Randy Komisar, and four Bay Area residents on a rooftop in Chinatown to discuss the love of a great city. - One Art, by Elizabeth Bishop
E2One Art, by Elizabeth Bishop“The art of losing isn’t hard to master,” Bishop wrote in the poem, "One Art", universally considered one of her greatest. Journalist Katie Couric, media executives Sheryl Sandberg and Yang Lan, singer/songwriter Mary Chapin Carpenter, poet Gregory Orr, and others discuss Bishop’s masterpiece on losses, great and small. - The Fish, by Marianne Moore
E3The Fish, by Marianne MooreThis environmental science-themed episode explores Marianne Moore's great poem of marine life. Vice President Al Gore, poet Jorie Graham, and scientists from Conservation International dive into Moore's portrayal of the always-changing ocean, and its future in a warming world. - This Your Home Now, by Mark Doty
E4This Your Home Now, by Mark DotyHost Elisa New talks with poet Mark Doty, psychologist Steven Pinker, choreographer Bill T. Jones, writer and fashion commentator Simon Doonan, and designer Jonathan Adler about this poem in which a visit to the barber shop sparks a meditation on love, the AIDS crisis, masculinity, home, and getting older. - Finishing the Hat, by Stephen Sondheim
E5Finishing the Hat, by Stephen SondheimStephen Sondheim is widely hailed as the greatest modern American musical theater composer. In this episode, Broadway stage actors Raúl Esparza, Melissa Errico, Donna Lynne Champlin, Kerry O'Malley, Andrew Arrow, and writer Adam Gopnik give voice-in speech and song-to Sondheim's singular ability to blend lyrics and music, using as their case study this song from his Pulitzer Prize-winning musical Sunday in the Park with George. - You and I Are Disappearing -- Yusef Komunyakaa
E6You and I Are Disappearing -- Yusef KomunyakaaPoet Yusef Komunyakaa went to the Vietnam War as a journalist but came home a poet. This episode explores how things experienced during war can still burn in memory and on the page decades later. Former Secretary of State John Kerry, film and theatre director Julie Taymor, composer Elliot Goldenthal, a chorus of Vietnam War veterans, and Komunyakaa himself discuss the awful mix of beauty and horror in war-and the challenge of making art from it.
