| “When in doubt, look intelligent.” — Garrison Keillor | Your order helps support public radio. In this week's EXTRA, we spotlight poet Thomas Lux and feature the poetry of Minnesota poet Joyce Sutphen, Wendell Berry, Emily Dickinson, and Anne Sexton, plus the latest release from our host Garrison Keillor – his final broadcast as host of A Prairie Home Companion. |
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| | Poetry from The Writer's Almanac |
The Green House
By Joyce Sutphen Poet Joyce Sutphen was born and raised in Saint Joseph, Minnesota (1949). Sutphen writes often about rural life, childhood, family, and love. Fellow Minnesota poet Louis Jenkins calls her “a true daughter of the Minnesota soil.” Sutphen had an idyllic childhood in Saint Joseph, roaming the woods and fields near her parent’s farm with her nine brothers and sisters. She says, “We played in the hay barn doing circus daredevil tricks, sculpted civilizations in the sand pile.” There were always plenty of chores around the farm and she spent long hours picking strawberries, milking, hoeing potatoes, weeding, and driving a tractor. She loved all of it, but, she says, “My true pleasure was in books and libraries.” Sutphen devoured series like Trixie Belden and The Black Stallion, and later moved on to books by John Steinbeck, George Orwell, and Aldous Huxley. Sutphen earned a PhD in Renaissance drama from the University of Minnesota. In 1990, she was overseas, on a break from her studies, when she began to consider a life not just of studying poetry, but also of writing it. Away from her husband and children, she found herself with time, and her own room, and she found herself writing nonstop. She said: “It was so amazing. I got a little more rest, and I became a different person. I just expanded, and the poetry was there, like an untapped thing I turned on.” Those early poems formed the basis for her first collection of poetry, Straight Out of View (1995). Sutphen is now a professor at Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter, Minnesota. On being both a Shakespearean scholar and a poet, Sutphen says, “I like thinking about literary work, but with the time I have, I like writing poems.” Sutphen is the author of several books of poetry, including Coming Back to the Body(2000), Fourteen Sonnets (2005), First Words (2010), House of Possibility (2013), and Modern Love & Other Myths (2015). Her book Naming The Stars (2004) won the Minnesota Book Award in poetry. In 2011, she was appointed poet laureate of the State of Minnesota by Governor Mark Dayton. On writing poetry, Sutphen says: “Poetry makes the world real for me […] in the end, it isn’t hard. When I sit down to write a poem, one thing just leads to another.” The Green House is her most recent collection. Poems from the Book: Bird Song, Cannon River Bottoms A Dream of the Future |
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The historic final broadcast featuring host Garrison Keillor LIVE from the Hollywood Bowl.
After 40-plus years of delighting radio audiences each Saturday night with America's favorite live variety show, A Prairie Home Companion founder and host Garrison Keillor bids farewell with an unforgettable performance from the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California. It's a duet singing extravaganza, with Sara Watkins, Sarah Jarosz, Aoife O'Donovan, Heather Masse, and Christine DiGiallonardo joining Garrison on time-honored American ballads, British Invasion romps, country-western weepers, and Broadway classics. 2 CDs plus a souvenir booklet | |
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Every week, Garrison Keillor signs off his "News from Lake Wobegon" monologue with the signature expression "Where the women are strong. The men are good looking. And all of the children are above average." Many fans at the live broadcasts expressed that this sentiment fit their family perfectly and, after seeing our personalized wood sign, asked if we had the quotation featured on a doormat. The wood sign was rectangular in shape, so we simply transferred the design to a rectangular-shaped doormat that can be personalized with a surname over the top of Garrison’s signature quote. Since then, we've gone through several different designs and were forced to switch vendors, and now we have settled on the half moon shape design that is a bit sturdier and crafted of natural coir with a rubber backing.
Garrison is not the biggest fan of the doormat as when it first debuted for sale, it actually outsold his new book (never before had a gift item done this!). So, if the expression describes your family or one that you know that is headed by a strong woman, includes a good looking man and has “above average” children, you might give this wonderful doormat a try. If it’s perfect for the Bunsens, then it must be good enough for you! (NOTE: We order 300 of the substrates at a time and can take up to 12 weeks to produce and put notes on the website during times when we are out. BTW — the "The" comes pre-printed on the doormat above your last name and has garnered more than a few hilarious stories, so please be aware that it is pre-printed. Your last name will print exactly as you type it, so check punctuation and spelling!) As always, sign up for our Facebook fanpage and follow us on Twitter to keep up with all the news! Have a great week!
Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.® |
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