Ted Kooser was born in Ames, Iowa, an area within the great plains of America. He credits his influences to both his mother and his father. His father worked as a store manager while his mother stayed home to raise him and his sister. During an interview he was asked how his parents influenced his poetry, he replied, "My Father was a storekeeper, loved the public, and was a marvelous storyteller. I remember a women once said to me that she'd rather hear my dad describe a person than see the person herself." (Meats, 335). One can tell from reading Kooser's poetry that his father influenced him greatly. Ted Kooser also attained a strong work ethic from his father, which in his formative years allowed him to prosper and become the poet he is today. His mother influenced his appreciation for the natural wonders in life. Kooser attended Iowa State University, where he earned a bachelor of science degree in 1962. Upon graduating, he held a teaching job as an English teacher in Madrid, Iowa during the 1962-1963 school year. He soon moved to Lincoln, Nebraska where he was accepted into the University of Nebraska's at Lincoln graduate program for creative writing. He would not immediately graduate from the program, but take a job in the insurance industry where during his tenure, he would become the Vice President for Lincoln Benefit Life.
Ted Kooser is an American poet that draws readers for his simplicity and accessibility written within his poems. His use of metaphors within his verse describes images to the readers that normally wouldn't been seen. His simplicity, not the type that has no substance but simplicity where readers can understand what he is trying to say within the poem due to the realism Kooser writes with. The dicti...
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...long career provides a lighthouse of hope to all artists who labor in the dark, uncertain of their efforts but determined to express their voice." (Schneider, 129).
Works Cited
De Grave, Kathleen. "Delights & Shadows: Poems." Midwest Quarterly 46.4 (2005):
439-440. Academic Search Premier. Web. 12 Mar. 2014.
Evans, David Allan. "Ted Kooser—An Appreciation." Midwest Quarterly 46.4 (2005):
356-359. Academic Search Premier. Web. 10 Mar. 2014.
Meats, Stephen. "A Tribute To Ted Kooser: An Interview With Ted Kooser.(Interview)."
The Midwest Quarterly 4 (2005): 335. Academic OneFile. Web. 10 Mar. 2014.
Schneider, Steven P. "Kooser, Ted (1939—)." American Writers: A Collection of
Literary Biographies, Supplement 19. Ed. Jay Parini. Detroit: Charles Scribner's
Sons, 2010. 115-130. Scribner Writers on GVRL. Web. 10 Mar. 2014.
Ryan reminds us of the suggestive power of poetry–how it elicits and rewards the reader’s intellect, imagination, and emotions. I like to think that Ryan’s magnificently compressed poetry – along with the emergence of other new masters of the short poem like Timothy Murphy and H.L. Hix and the veteran maestri like Ted Kooser and Dick Davis – signals a return to concision and intensity.
When I read poetry, I often tend to look first at its meaning and second at how it is written, or its form. The mistake I make when I do this is in assuming that the two are separate, when, in fact, often the meaning of poetry is supported or even defined by its form. I will discuss two poems that embody this close connection between meaning and form in their central use of imagery and repetition. One is a tribute to Janis Joplin, written in 1983 by Alice Fulton, entitled “You Can’t Rhumboogie in a Ball and Chain.” The second is a section from Walt Whitman’s 1,336-line masterpiece, “Song of Myself,” first published in 1855. The imagery in each poem differs in purpose and effect, and the rhythms, though created through repetition in both poems, are quite different as well. As I reach the end of each poem, however, I am left with a powerful human presence lingering in the words. In Fulton’s poem, that presence is the live-hard-and-die-young Janis Joplin; in Whitman’s poem, the presence created is an aspect of the poet himself.
Strand, Mark and Evan Boland. The Making of a Poem: A Norton Anthology of Poetic Forms. New
... some points I'm going to cross common experiences. Some of them are going to stick and become a little bit peculiarly mine . . . I don't worry about that. I worry about the paintings . . . the drive to make art ("Concepts in career: Frank Stella").
In “A Rainy Morning” by Ted Kooser, we get a lot of imagery, as well as figures of speech, specifically metaphors. This poem through the use of an extended metaphor helps us to see life and our everyday actions into a new perspective. Here we will examine the poem’s language and imagery to help understand what the theme of “A Rainy Morning” is.
...ictures for the reader. The similar use of personification in “Snapping Beans” by Lisa Parker and the use of diction and imagery in “Nighttime Fires” by Regina Barreca support how the use of different poetic devices aid in imagery. The contrasting tones of “Song” by John Donne and “Love Poem” by John Frederick Nims show how even though the poems have opposite tones of each other, that doesn’t mean the amount of imagery changes.
This marked the beginning of his inspiration to form a personal, expressive, and religious stance on his art values and style. He has found his process and content that will be apparent in his future work.
Mademoiselle Reisz states to Edna that in order to be considered an artist, "one must possess many gifts-absolute gifts-which have not been acquired by one’s own effort. And, moreover, to succeed, the artist must possess the courageous soul." (63) Although Edna and Mademoiselle share many characteristics that may possibly contribute to their future paths, they have one stifling difference; Mademoiselle Reisz possesses the wisdom to live the way that she does, Edna Pontellier does not.
Ferguson, Margaret W. , Mary Jo Salter, and Jon Stallworthy. The Norton Anthology Of Poetry. shorter fifth edition. New York, New York: W W Norton & Co Inc, 2005. print.
With fewer than fifty published poems Elizabeth Bishop is not one of the most prominent poets of our time. She is however well known for her use of imagery and her ability to convey the narrator?s emotions to the reader. In her vividly visual poem 'The Fish', the reader is exposed to a story wherein the use of language not only draws the reader into the story but causes the images to transcend the written work. In the poem, Bishop makes use of numerous literary devices such as similes, adjectives, and descriptive language. All of these devices culminate in the reader experiencing a precise and detailed mental image of the poem's setting and happenings.
“The Fish,” written by Elizabeth Bishop in 1946, is perhaps most known for its incredible use of imagery, but this analysis does not merely focus on imagery. Instead, it is based on a quote by Mark Doty from his essay “A Tremendous Fish.” In it he says, “‘The Fish’” is a carefully rendered model of an engaged mind at work” (Doty). After reading this statement, it causes one to reflect more in-depth about how the poem was written, and not just about what its literal meaning lays out. In “The Fish,” Bishop’s utilization of certain similes, imagery in the last few lines, narrative poem style, and use of punctuation allows the audience to transport into the life of the fish; therefore, allowing them to understand Bishop’s ideas on freedom and wisdom.
Poetry is a craft of near-paradox. Poets often say that they aim to encase the abstract within the concrete, describe without adjectives or adverbs, and expound upon concepts with the utmost concision. To meet these formidable challenges, they keep several important literary devices at their disposal, one of which is the conceit. Commonly defined as an elaborately extended metaphor, the conceit often allows poets to capture complicated ideas through comparison with images closer to readers’ everyday experiences. If the concept that the poet wishes to illustrate comes from the theological or philosophical fields, figurative language like the conceit can rescue the poet from didacticism as well as opacity. “On a Drop of Dew,” a short poem by the metaphysical poet Andrew Marvell, employs the conceit for just this purpose. Marvell’s use of the conceit allows him convey the Christian story of the human soul in his poem with subtlety and simplicity, from its birth in heaven through its placement on earth and eventual reunion with God in heaven.
After graduating high school in 1917, he decided not to attend college, even after his father’s urging. Instead, he went to report for the Kansas City Star, where his editor told him to “ ‘Use short sentences. Use short first paragraphs. Use vigorous English’ ” ( qtd. in Harmon 2). This shaped his unique and simple writing style that stayed with him for the rest of his life (Harmon 2).
The arts have influenced my life in amazing ways. Throughout my life, art has been the place I run to and my escape from the world. As I’ve grown older, art has become so much more than that. Every piece of art I create is a journey into my soul. It’s a priceless way to deal with my emotions and my struggles. I create art not only because I enjoy it and because I want to, but because I have to. Somewhere deep inside there is a driving force, urging me to put my heart down on paper. I become emotionally attached to each of my pieces because they are like dashes on the wall marking my growth. Each one is the solution to a problem I have dealt with and overcome.
The time to breathe before advancing further in my future projects, the difficult moments instead of discouraging me, these moments give me motivation and the necessary energy to move forward. I am optimist but realistic. My parents taught me that we live in a world that is constantly changing and to succeed we need a smart plan and the ability to adapt and adjust to the changing world environment but more importantly one need to prepare one’s self to succeed. We need discipline and above all an unshakable will to resist difficulties when they happen. “An ongoing work of art” would probably be one of the best ways to describe my life. From very early on in life, I have learn that I can be the artist of my own life through guidance and hard work, I learned that we are the architecture of our life, the artist of our own destiny through work, commitment and determination. Every route taken or not taken will somehow impact our existence and leave a trail like a shooting star in the night sky, the beauty of the trail depends entirely on the nature of our actions in life. This is the first time in my existence I have had the opportunity to write the story of my life in detail. This exercise