{"product_id":"conversations-with-billy-collins-john-cusatis-9781496840660","title":"Conversations with Billy Collins","description":"Billy Collins \"puts the 'fun' back in profundity,\" says poet Alice Fulton. Known for what he has called \"hospitable\" poems, which deftly blend wit and erudition, Collins (b. 1941) is a poet of nearly unprecedented popularity. His work is also critically esteemed and well represented in \u003ci\u003eThe Norton Anthology of American Literature\u003c\/i\u003e. An English professor for five decades, Collins was fifty-seven when his poetry began gathering considerable international attention. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003ci\u003eConversations with Billy Collins\u003c\/i\u003e chronicles the poet's career beginning with his 1998 interview with Terry Gross on \u003ci\u003eFresh Air\u003c\/i\u003e, which exponentially expanded his readership, three years prior to his being named United States Poet Laureate. Other interviewers range from George Plimpton, founder of the \u003ci\u003eParis Revi\u003c\/i\u003ee\u003ci\u003ew\u003c\/i\u003e, to Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Henry Taylor to a Presbyterian pastor, a physics professor, and a class of AP English Literature students. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Over the course of the twenty-one interviews included in the volume, Collins discusses such topics as discovering his persona, that consistently affable voice that narrates his often wildly imaginative poems; why poetry is so loved by children but often met with anxiety by high school students; and his experience composing a poem to be recited during a joint session of Congress on the first anniversary of 9\/11, a tragedy that occurred during his tenure as poet laureate. He also explores his love of jazz, his distaste for gratuitously difficult poetry and autobiographical poems, and his beguiling invention of a mock poetic form: the paradelle. Irreverent, incisive, and deeply life-affirming--like his twelve volumes of poetry--these interviews, gathered for the first time in one volume, will edify and entertain readers in the way his sold-out readings have done for the past quarter century.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e John Cusatis\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 1496840666\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781496840660\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e University Press of Mississippi\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 07\/27\/2022\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 234\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.13lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.69d","brand":"John Cusatis","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":44128106086655,"sku":"9781496840660","price":99.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_45448355-e3cd-4f3b-a440-f835956a9ab0.jpg?v=1687456978","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/conversations-with-billy-collins-john-cusatis-9781496840660","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}