The Century of the Cyclops
Steven Faulkner on the Loss of Poetry as Necessary Knowledge
Someone recently won a $75,000 poetry prize. I don’t recall the poet’s name. The sponsors of the prize thought that big bucks would help revive interest in poetry. The winner of the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize for $25,000, Charles Wright, admitted that this country’s interest in poetry is in something of a free fall, but he hoped these large prizes would arrest that fall. I doubt it will help.
Who reads modern poetry? A reporter for National Public Radio interviewed another poet who said that people may no longer know why “The woods—are lovely, dark and deep,” but they do understand the money message. If someone forks out 75 big ones for poems, poems must be valuable property.
THIS ARTICLE ONLY AVAILABLE TO SUBSCRIBERS.
FOR QUICK ACCESS:
Get six issues (one year) of Touchstone PLUS full online access including pdf downloads for only $39.95. That's only $3.34 per month!
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95. That's only $1.66 per month!
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more from the online archives
32.6—November/December 2019
The Year of Our Lord 1943: Christian Humanism in an Age of Crisis by Alan Jacobs by Jesse Russell
33.4—July/August 2020
Our Views on the President Are Not Crucial by S. M. Hutchens
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
