Galway Kinnell: "The Book of Nightmares"

When I came across this engaging and moving video by Nicholas S. Kritter, which includes Galway Kinnell reading a section from his book-length poem The Book of Nightmares (1971), I was reminded of the first time I’d heard Kinnell present the work. Shortly after the book was published, I attended a reading of it by Kinnell at the Donnell Library Center auditorium in New York City. At the time, I was an undergraduate taking my first courses in creative writing and discovering a passion for poetry.

Kinnell’s magnificently dramatic reading, during which he offered the entire book-length piece mostly from memory, proved compelling and persuasive as I realized how powerful a poem could be. Kinnell based material in The Book of Nightmares upon his antiwar activism during the Vietnam era and his experiences as a volunteer for the Congress of Racial Equality in the South, as well as his efforts in support of integration and voter registration during the sixties in Louisiana, a location now again in the news for more racial conflict in the city of Jena. However, alongside the death and pain inherent in those subjects of war and racism, Kinnell’s poem is framed by images of life and joy, the births of his two children, Maud and Fergus.

As I mentioned in a recent entry, the visiting writers series for this academic year already has begun at Valparaiso University, and I hope my students are fortunate enough to be rewarded by witnessing an inspiring presentation by one of our guest poets the way I was influenced, and continue to be, by my attendance at Kinnell’s reading so long ago.

Galway Kinnell’s most recent collection of poems, Strong Is Your Hold, was published at the end of 2006, only a few months before he turned 80 earlier this year. Kinnell has received the Pulitzer Prize, a National Book Award, the Frost Medal, and a MacArthur Fellowship. Kinnell’s volumes of poetry include Strong Is Your Hold; A New Selected Poems; Imperfect Thirst; When One Has Lived a Long Time Alone; Selected Poems; The Past; Mortal Acts, Mortal Words; The Book of Nightmares; Body Rags; Flower Herding on Mount Monadnock; and What a Kingdom It Was. He is the editor of The Essential Whitman. He has also published translations of works by Yves Bonnefoy, Yvan Goll, and François Villon, and Rainer Maria Rilke.

One can examine online the text of The Book of Nightmares, including the excerpt Kinnell reads in Kritter’s video. For more complete information on Galway Kinnell, I suggest his web page at the Poetry Foundation.