133 - Think Like a Poet - Ryan Wilson

05/25/22 • 158 min

In a wide-ranging and erudite interview, poet and translator Ryan Wilson joins the podcast to discuss how the poet makes use of the classical virtue of xenia or hospitality, what poets can learn from the work of translation, the "romantic turn" (inner vision) and the "classical turn" (communication/craft) in poetry, the great Latin poet Horace, and more. Ryan performs, in his dynamic style, classic poems by Horace and others, as well as his own poems.

Ryan Wilson is an adjunct professor of English at the Catholic University of America, editor of the journal Literary Matters, and a visiting professor of poetry in the MFA program at the University of St. Thomas in Houston. He is the author of three books: The Stranger World, a collection of original poems; How to Think Like a Poet; and Proteus Bound: Selected Translations, 2008-2020. Forthcoming are his anthology of contemporary Catholic poetry from Paraclete Press (spring 2023), and another book of original poems, The Ghostlight.

Timestamps

0:00 - Proteus Bound

13:09 - Hospitality as fundamental principle of community, thought, and poetry

28:05 - The romantic turn and the classical turn

46:22 - Ryan Wilson, “Xenia”

53:39 - Proteus, Hermes, and Orpheus as figures of the poet

1:03:35 - Translation as training for the poet

1:17:47 - The Latin poetry of Horace

2:07:55 - Charles Baudelaire, “The Voice”

2:20:00 - How Ryan relates as a Catholic to classical literature

2:27:10 - Ryan Wilson, “Philoctetes”

Links

Proteus Bound: Selected Translations, 2008-2020 https://www.cuapress.org/9781736656129/proteus-bound/

How to Think Like a Poet https://www.wisebloodbooks.com/store/p97/How_to_Think_Like_a_Poet%2C_by_Ryan_Wilson.html

The Stranger World http://www.measurepress.com/measure/index.php/catalog/books/stranger-world/

Literary Matters https://www.literarymatters.org/

This podcast is a production of CatholicCulture.org. If you like the show, please consider supporting us! http://catholicculture.org/donate/audio

Timestamps

0:00 - Proteus Bound

13:09 - Hospitality as fundamental principle of community, thought, and poetry

28:05 - The romantic turn and the classical turn

46:22 - Ryan Wilson, “Xenia”

53:39 - Proteus, Hermes, and Orpheus as figures of the poet

1:03:35 - Translation as training for the poet

1:17:47 - The Latin poetry of Horace

2:07:55 - Charles Baudelaire, “The Voice”

2:20:00 - How Ryan relates as a Catholic to classical literature

2:27:10 - Ryan Wilson, “Philoctetes”

Links

Proteus Bound: Selected Translations, 2008-2020 https://www.cuapress.org/9781736656129/proteus-bound/

How to Think Like a Poet https://www.wisebloodbooks.com/store/p97/How_to_Think_Like_a_Poet%2C_by_Ryan_Wilson.html

The Stranger World http://www.measurepress.com/measure/index.php/catalog/books/stranger-world/

Literary Matters https://www.literarymatters.org/

This podcast is a production of CatholicCulture.org. If you like the show, please consider supporting us! http://catholicculture.org/donate/audio

Previous Episode

132 - Technology and the Artist: Glenn Gould in the Studio

"The justification of art is the internal combustion it ignites in the hearts of men and not its shallow, externalized, public manifestations. The purpose of art is not the release of a momentary ejection of adrenaline but is, rather, the gradual, lifelong construction of a state of wonder and serenity." - Glenn Gould

One of the greatest classical pianists of the 20th century, Glenn Gould, shocked the world at age thirty-one when he announced his permanent retirement from public performance. Denouncing the concert hall as a relative of the Roman Colosseum and audiences as a "force of evil", for the sake of his artistic integrity and personal sanity he committed the rest of his musical life to recording in the studio.

Gould's brilliant and sometimes provocative performances of classical masterworks are well known, especially his unequaled recordings of Bach. But he was also a prolific, articulate, and no less provocative critic. In essays like "The Prospects of Recording", he laid out his philosophy of performance, of the relation between technology and music.

He described his own experimentation with unconventional recording techniques, and made bold and often accurate predictions about how recording technology would change how the average person would relate to music. And he outright rejected many of the stagnant conventions of contemporary classical performance.

In this episode, Thomas discusses Gould's fascinating (and often entertaining) views on music and technology, and plays a number of his recordings. If you've never heard Gould play, you're missing out. If you have, you'll find this episode all the more interesting.

Pieces played in this episode (all performed by Glenn Gould):

J. S. Bach, Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I: Prelude and Fugue no. 3 in C-sharp major, Fugue no. 20 in A major, Prelude no. 21 in B-flat major

Bach, Two- and Three-Part Inventions: Invention no. 12 in A major, Sinfonia no. 5 in E-flat major, Sinfonia no. 9 in F minor

Brahms, Intermezzo No. 2 in A major, op. 118

Beethoven, Symphony No. 5, IV. Allegro, piano transcription by Franz Liszt

Thomas Mirus's 2011 essay "Glenn Gould in the Studio" https://thomasmirus.com/2013/05/20/glenn-gould-in-the-studio

This podcast is a production of CatholicCulture.org. If you like the show, please consider supporting us! http://catholicculture.org/donate/audio

Next Episode

134 - The Political Form of Evil - D. C. Schindler

D. C. Schindler's book The Politics of the Real: The Church between Liberalism and Integralism is one of the richest entries in the ongoing Catholic debate over liberalism, political authority, the common good, and the relation between Church and State.

Schindler offers subtle, convincing arguments as to why liberalism is "the political form of evil", specifically consisting of a rejection of the Christian form - specifically, the Jewish-Greek-Roman synthesis embodied in the Catholic Church.

Liberalism creates a situation like that described by comedian Stephen Wright: "Last night somebody broke into my apartment and replaced everything with exact duplicates." It adopts aspects of the Western tradition but only on radically different grounds, with a fragmented vision of reality. Even when liberalism claims to make room for religious tradition, it does so only by reconceiving religion as a mere object of individual choice - that is, precisely as non-traditional.

But Schindler goes beyond criticizing liberalism, offering a profound and beautiful ontology of the social order and a somewhat different model of the relation between Church and State from the one proposed by Catholic integralists.

Schindler joins the podcast to discuss the book, including topics such as:

Why objecting to non-liberal philosophy as "impractical" is a rejection of man as a rational creature
Liberalism's false claim of neutrality (or non-confessionalism)
The "Christian form" and its fragmentation
Why liberalism is “the political form of evil”
The roots of liberalism in medieval nominalism
The anti-Catholic meaning of the Declaration of Independence's “laws of nature and of nature’s God”
How the "neutral public square" subverts every tradition it "makes room for"
The problem with distinguishing "civil society" from the state
Why property is central to understanding the relation between individuals and society

Links

The Politics of the Real https://newpolity.com/new-polity-press-titles/the-politics-of-the-real

This podcast is a production of CatholicCulture.org. If you like the show, please consider supporting us! http://catholicculture.org/donate/audio