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<em>The World is Fundamentally a Great Wonder</em> <br>a conversation with Richard Wilbur

In an interview with Arlo Haskell, Richard Wilbur discusses his relationships with Robert Frost and Wallace Stevens, his years living in Key West, his real feelings about 'formal poetry,' and his place in the republic of letters.

Posted by Arlo Haskell on October 21, 2009 12:09 PM

The Trouble with Robert Frost and Wallace Stevens

"Robert Frost was on the beach this morning and is coming to dinner this evening." So did Wallace Stevens write to his wife Elsie in February of 1935 from the Casa Marina, a hotel on the Atlantic Ocean where he spent part of each winter in Key West for nearly 20 years. Frost and Stevens today are broadly acknowledged as literary peers, but in 1935 the two poets' reputations were leagues apart. Frost had won the Pulitzer Prize twice, while Stevens had published only a single volume, <em>Harmonium</em>, more than a decade earlier. While Stevens had earned the approval of influential readers including <em>Poetry</em> editor Harriet Monroe, Frost was not among them, once complaining that he didn't like Stevens's work &quot;because it purports to make me think."

Posted by Arlo Haskell on April 14, 2009 4:47 PM