Remembering Susan Fromberg Schaeffer (1940-2011)

Over this past weekend I was saddened when I learned about the death of Susan Fromberg Schaeffer. Reports indicate that she died on Friday of a stroke. She was 71. Susan had already been in very poor health due to a previous stroke she had suffered a few years ago that greatly affected her mobility and deprived her of speech.

I am honored to state that Susan had been a teacher and strong supporter of my writing when I was discovering my way as an undergraduate student as well as during graduate years obtaining an M.F.A. in Creative Writing at Brooklyn College. Indeed, when I changed my major to English in the middle of my sophomore year, Susan provided valuable and encouraging advice. I admired the novels—Falling and Anya, still one of my favorites—and the poetry collection, Granite Lady, she was producing while I was her student, and I regarded her as a mentor whose opinion mattered to me very much.

During my senior year, as Susan was putting together plans for the M.F.A. program in creative writing she co-founded at Brooklyn College, she approached me with an offer to be among the members of its first class. At the time, openings in creative writing graduate studies were rare since the number of such programs nationally only amounted to about a dozen. Today, hundreds of universities contain graduate creative writing programs. Susan knew I had been considering a recommendation from another teacher, Mark Strand, to join the Writers’ Workshop of his alma mater at the University of Iowa; however, I had family, a job, social connections, and personal obligations in New York I felt I could not leave at that time. Also, I wasn’t completely sure yet that a graduate degree in creative writing was the right route for me to follow.

I remember Susan generously inviting me to her home not far from the college campus and explaining I could maintain all my ties in New York while furthering my study of writing, which she felt was important. Moreover, her main point of persuasion included the fact that she wanted me to take courses from a prominent new faculty member who was being brought in to help introduce the program, John Ashbery. Despite all she had taught me, she believed I would benefit more from his guidance. Thankfully, Susan’s argument was compelling, and I agreed to enroll in that initial graduate class in creative writing at Brooklyn College. This decision set in motion a shift in direction that has determined the path I have followed ever since.

Furthermore, as I was completing my M.F.A., Susan suggested to editor Al Poulin the poetry manuscript I was writing as my thesis, declaring it would be ideal for publication by his press, BOA Editions. Poulin also received a second recommendation from John Ashbery. When Poulin solicited and accepted the manuscript, he asked Ashbery to write a foreword for the book. Susan had modestly agreed that John was the right person to contribute the preface for my work. Eventually, the publication of that first collection and its selection as a finalist for a distinguished book award assured my place for a fellowship in a competitive Ph.D. program at Utah, which led to my career as an English professor at Valparaiso University.

More than a decade later, when Valparaiso University hosted a series of visits by authors who had written novels concerning the Vietnam War, I was pleased to invite Susan to campus as a participant on a panel discussing literature about war and as a speaker to offer a reading from her book, Buffalo Afternoon, as well as to explain the extensive research she had done interviewing Vietnam veterans. Throughout her discussions about her work and her process of writing, Susan demonstrated the deliberate approach to detail evidenced in her publications, and she charmed all with her self-effacing humor.

Although she delighted my students and me with her presence and the wonderful talk she delivered, Susan kindly confided to me that upon receiving my invitation, she had been more interested in witnessing the point at which I had arrived in my journey since those early days when I was a student just starting to explore the possibilities of language in her introductory creative writing class. We reminisced quite a bit during the days of her visit. Indeed, I remember fondly our conversations during the four hours of driving in my car to and from Indianapolis. I thanked her a number of times for the wise advice and heartening encouragement she had given me when I needed such counsel and support as a beginning writer.

Susan Fromberg Schaeffer authored fourteen novels, a half dozen poetry collections, a couple of children’s books, and numerous short stories. She was among the rare writers successful at both fiction and poetry. Her volume of poems, Granite Lady, was a finalist for the National Book Award. Her short stories won a few O’Henry Awards. Her novels were critically acclaimed and achieved significant readership. Her books deserve even more readers, and I would recommend them to everyone.

Nevertheless, I will always remember Susan for more than those fine accomplishments as an author. Today, as I reflect, I recall the care she displayed toward her students, the warmth she showed toward me as a novice writer, the particular consideration she gave my work, her thoughtfulness expressed in her actions on my behalf, the friendliness exhibited in those long-ago conversations, and again I am thankful. Once more, I feel honored.

Poem of the Week: “Labor Day Party” by Floyd Skloot

The VPR Poem of the Week is Floyd Skloot’s “Labor Day Party,” which appeared in the Spring/Summer 2002 issue (Volume III, Number 2) of Valparaiso Poetry Review. “Labor Day Party” also was published in Poetry from Paradise Valley (Pecan Grove Press, 2010), an anthology of poems from the first decade of VPR recently selected as a finalist in poetry for the Best Books of Indiana competition sponsored by the Indiana Center for the Book, supported by the Indiana State Library.

Floyd Skloot is a nonfiction writer, poet, and novelist whose work has been published widely in periodicals such as American Scholar, Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s, New York Times, Poetry, Sewanee Review, Southern Review, and Virginia Quarterly Review. His fifteen books include Selected Poems: 1970-2005 (Tupelo Press, 2008), which won a 2009 Pacific NW Booksellers Association Book Award. His sixth collection of new poems, The Snow’s Music, appeared from LSU Press in 2008. He received the 2004 PEN USA Literary Award in Creative Nonfiction for his memoir, In the Shadow of Memory (University of Nebraska Press, 2003). His recent memoir, The Wink of the Zenith: The Shaping of a Writer’s Life, was published by the University of Nebraska Press in 2008.

Tuesday of each week One Poet’s Notes highlights an excellent work by a poet selected from the issues of Valparaiso Poetry Review, except when other posts with news or updates preempt the usual appearance of this item, with the recommendation that readers revisit it.

Photo Friday: “Day-Tripper”

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Poem of the Week: “Midwest: Georgics” by David Baker

The VPR Poem of the Week is David Baker’s “Midwest: Georgics,” which appeared in the Spring/Summer 2002 issue (Volume III, Number 2) of Valparaiso Poetry Review. “Midwest Georgics” also was published in Poetry from Paradise Valley (Pecan Grove Press, 2010), an anthology of poems from the first decade of VPR recently selected as a finalist in poetry for the Best Books of Indiana competition sponsored by the Indiana Center for the Book, supported by the Indiana State Library.

David Baker is the author of seven books of poetry, most recently Never-Ending Birds (W.W. Norton, 2009), for which he was named the winner of the Theodore Roethke Memorial Poetry Prize, a triennial award offered for a superior poetry volume published within the previous three years. Baker’s other awards include fellowships and prizes from the National Endowment for the Arts, John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, Ohio Arts Council, Society of Midland Authors, Poetry Society of America, and the Pushcart Foundation. He has also published two books of literary criticism. His poems and essays appear in such magazines as Atlantic Monthly, Nation, New Republic, New Yorker, Paris Review, Poetry, and many others. Baker teaches at Denison University, and he is the poetry editor of Kenyon Review.

Tuesday of each week One Poet’s Notes highlights an excellent work by a poet selected from the issues of Valparaiso Poetry Review, except when other posts with news or updates preempt the usual appearance of this item, with the recommendation that readers visit it.

Photo Friday: “Hanging Out”

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Poem of the Week: “Mine Own Phil Levine” by Dorianne Laux

The VPR Poem of the Week is Dorianne Laux’s “Mine Own Phil Levine,” which appeared in the Fall/Winter 2009-2010 issue (Volume XI, Number 1) of Valparaiso Poetry Review. Last week, the Library of Congress named Philip Levine the new Poet Laureate of the United States.

“Mine Own Phil Levine” was also published in Poetry from Paradise Valley (Pecan Grove Press, 2010), an anthology of poems from the first decade of VPR , which has been selected as a finalist in poetry for the Best Books of Indiana competition sponsored by the Indiana Center for the Book, supported by the Indiana State Library.

Dorianne Laux is the author of five collections of poetry, most recently The Book of Men (W.W. Norton, 2011). She is also the coauthor, with Kim Addonizio, of The Poet’s Companion. Among her awards are a Pushcart Prize, two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, and a Guggenheim fellowship. What We Carry (BOA Editions, 1994) was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Her fourth book of poems, Facts about the Moon (W.W. Norton, 2007), reviewed in One Poet’s Notes, was the recipient of the Oregon Book Award and was short-listed for the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize. Laux teaches at North Carolina State University and lives in Raleigh with her husband, the poet Joseph Millar.

Tuesday of each week One Poet’s Notes highlights an excellent work by a poet selected from the issues of Valparaiso Poetry Review, except when other posts with news or updates preempt the usual appearance of this item, with the recommendation that readers visit it.

Photo Friday: “Contemplation Rose”

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Philip Levine New U.S. Poet Laureate

The New York Times is reporting that the Library of Congress will name Philip Levine the new Poet Laureate of the United States today. James Billington, the librarian of Congress, is quoted in a description of Levine: “He’s the laureate, if you like, of the industrial heartland. It’s a very, very American voice.”

As I wrote in an article at One Poet’s Notes marking Levine’s 80th birthday in January of 2008, Philip Levine “was born in Detroit, Michigan. His upbringing among working-class immigrants and African Americans living under the rule of continuing racism forever shaped Levine’s view of the world. The family figures he knew as a boy in the urban landscape of Detroit and the young men he met as a worker in its automobile factories have been ever-present as personages in his poetry. Even today, his poems often read as elegant yet plain-spoken elegies giving tribute to those who were battered and scarred, who felt chronic pain suffered during everyday battles, or those outcasts and artists (particularly writers and jazz musicians) who lived on the edges of society, men and women he once knew and to whom he now has given voice, again and again.”

For more extensive and detailed commentary I have presented on Philip Levine and his poetry, I recommend readers visit the following: “Reading Philip Levine at Mother’s Day,” “Edgar Degas and Philip Levine,” “Philip Levine on His 80th Birthday,” "Philip Levine’s ‘What Work Is’ on Labor Day,” and “Philip Levine: Breath.”

Poem of the Week: “Miracle Day” by Sebastian Matthews

The VPR Poem of the Week is Sebastian Matthews’s “Miracle Day,” which appeared in the Fall/Winter 2009-2010 issue (Volume XI, Number 1) of Valparaiso Poetry Review. “Miracle Day” was also published in Poetry from Paradise Valley (Pecan Grove Press, 2010), an anthology of poems from the first decade of VPR recently selected as a finalist in poetry for the Best Books of Indiana competition sponsored by the Indiana Center for the Book, supported by the Indiana State Library.

Sebastian Matthews is the author of two poetry collections, including We Generous (Red Hen Press, 2007), and a memoir, In My Father’s Footsteps (W. W. Norton, 2004). He co-edited, with Stanley Plumly, Search Party: Collected Poems of William Matthews (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2004). Matthews teaches at Warren Wilson College. His poetry or prose has appeared in American Poetry Review, Atlantic Monthly, Georgia Review, New England, Review, Poetry Daily, Poets & Writers, Seneca Review, The Sun, Tin House, Virginia Quarterly Review, The Writer’s Chronicle, and The Writer’s Almanac, among others. Matthews is an editor of Rivendell.

Tuesday of each week One Poet’s Notes highlights an excellent work by a poet selected from the issues of Valparaiso Poetry Review, except when other posts with news or updates preempt the usual appearance of this item, with the recommendation that readers revisit it.

Photo Friday: “Natural Abstract”

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Best Books of Indiana Finalists

I am pleased to report that on August 1st the State of Indiana announced finalists for the annual “Best Books of Indiana” competition sponsored by the Indiana Center for the Book, supported by the Indiana State Library, and the three finalists in the poetry category are as follows:

Poetry from Paradise Valley edited by Edward Byrne (Pecan Grove Press)
Seeded Light by Edward Byrne (Turning Point Books)
Shadows Set in Concrete by J.L. Kato (Restoration Press)

I am grateful that two of my volumes have been chosen, and I am particularly pleased Pecan Grove Press and Turning Point Books are included in the recognition. I wish to express my appreciation to the editors for both of those presses. In addition, I salute all the authors whose works were included in the anthology of poems selected from Valparaiso Poetry Review. I am also delighted to have my books named alongside J.L. Kato’s fine poetry.

A description at the government web page revealing the finalists for “Best Books of Indiana”—which are separated into four categories: Children/Young Adult, Fiction, Nonfiction, and Poetry— declares that “the Best Books of Indiana contest was created to honor Indiana's long and illustrious literary heritage and recognize Hoosier authors.” I am elated to have my work considered.

Readers are invited to visit the “Best Books of Indiana” page of the Center for the Book at the Indiana State Library web site, which notes: “Winners in all four categories will be announced by August 31.” I also urge everyone to visit the publishers’ web pages for Poetry from Paradise Valley and Seeded Light.