June 26, 2018 – When the email announcing Donald Hall’s death arrived Sunday morning, I was drafting a letter to him, which would include a blank bookplate for him to sign, for my pre-ordered copy of A Carnival of Losses; Notes Nearing Ninety, which the publisher may be rushing into print today.
In a letter dated 1 November 2016, in response to my comment about an essay from the book, already published by the New Yorker, he wrote:
“Yup, Double Solitude is in the new book. Last week I sent it to my agent and my editor. I haven’t heard yet. I like the title: “I-89,” with the subtitle Flashparagraphs Speeding Toward Ninety.”
At the time, I suppressed the notion that publication may be dragged out in order to capitalize on his death, which this Giant of Poetry had been working against at least since first being diagnosed with cancer in 1989.
My acquaintance with him began in 2012, thanks to the power of another essay published in the New Yorker, Out the Window, from his book Essays After Eighty. I recommended it to a friend, who read it then told me she had taken one of his classes at U. of Michigan in the 1960s. I suggested she send him a note, which she did; he responded right away saying “You probably want to take me to dinner.”
She told him that I was part of the bargain, arrangements were made, and in June 2012 I enjoyed the first of three visits with Donald Hall at Eagle Pond Farm, followed by dinner at restaurants in the vicinity of Wilmot, NH.
We last met in November, at the University of New Hampshire, which held a celebration thanking him for the donation of his papers – comprising 600 cubic feet. He read from his work and also delivered something of a valedictory lecture, finally reminding us that the poetry of Walt Whitman still hasn’t been surpassed.
Don was a guest on the June 2008 broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion, with Garrison Keillor, at Tanglewood, which I reviewed on BerkshireLinks. That gave me my opening line for when we met. Telling Don that I had been to that show, I referred to the host as simply “Garrison.” He stopped me in my tracks – “Garrison? He’s always been Mr. Keillor to me.”
A year or so later, after I had read Essays After Eighty, I sent him a note inviting him to re-visit the Berkshires, perhaps during Tanglewood season. Here’s an excerpt from his reply:
“I wish I could come down your way. [My friend] went down not long ago to look over the old Wharton place. I can’t drive any more, I can hardly walk, and needless to say I can’t fuck. I feel fine as you will discover reading the essays – but I cannot come to Tanglewood with the bachelor Norwegian farmer. He wrote me a dear and hilarious response to my Essays. Thank you and love, Don”
Why, you’re welcome Don, may you rest in peace.
Poems with reference to Don Hall
- Out the Window
- Machine Learning
- Eagle Pond Farm Market
- Afterparty
- His last published poem?
- Vowels of Bright Desire
Donald Hall on the web
Links to useful, entertaining, and eluciadting items related to Donald Hall, U.S. Poet Laureate 2006-07.
- The Web of Stories, “an archive of stories from people who have influenced our world…” – recorded at Eagle Pond Farm, Jan. 2005; there are 111 video clips of 5.5 minutes duration – Web of Stories;
- Comprehensive, up-to-date, bibliogrphy and related info by the publisher of Poetry magzine – including 54 poems, several essays by and about him: Poetry Foundation;
- His 2001 essay, “Death to the Death of Poetry,” is among the material posted here: Academy of American Poets;
- In their own words: “This guide compiles links to resources on Donald Hall throughout the Library of Congress Web site, as well as links to external Web sites that include features on Hall’s life or selections of his work.” Includes White House video of President Obama presenting him the National Medal of Arts in 20120: Library of Congress;
- NPR interview, 2014;
- Interview by Peter A. Stitt, The Paris Review, The Art of Poetry, No. 43 (Issue 120, Fall 1991); The Paris Review;
