The Observer, September 15, 2006
Volume XXXIX, Issue 3
Former Poet Laureate lectures on race and race awareness
Former Poet Laureate of the United States Rita Dove came to campus last Friday to give the second annual Anisfield-Wolf Lecture at Severance Hall. The lecture, co-sponsored by the Baker-Nord center for the Humanities and the SAGES program in conjunction with the Cleveland Foundation and the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards, was held during University Community Hour.
Dove won the 1987 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry, the National Humanities Medal, and the Heinz Award, among other literary honors. She served as Poet Laureate of the United States from 1993 to 1995.
In addition to her long list of accolades and merits, Dove was an obvious choice for lecturer: she served as a member on the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards board this year, helping to choose the books that would ultimately win the award. She also has written extensively on the subjects of racism and race awareness, the focus of the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards.
Some of the freshman class, who were required to go as part of their SAGES curriculum, was present at the lecture. In addition, many members of the surrounding community turned out, as well as students from two local high schools, including the Cleveland School of the Arts.
Many freshmen were curious as to why they were required to attend the lecture. "What does a poet have to do with SAGES?" tended to be a common question heard before and after the lecture.
Cyrus Taylor, interim dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, explained in his opening remarks that the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, were designed to promote race awareness and diversity, one of the goals of the SAGES program. Some, however, were not satisfied with that answer and left before the lecture was finished. Much of the freshman class failed to show up; only a handful of classes were completely present at the lecture.
After a second introduction by Religion Professor Timothy Beal, Dove came out. She told the crowd that instead of simply lecturing, she'd be mostly reading her poetry and commenting between poems.
She read many of her poems, selecting from the many books and collections she's written throughout her career. The subject matter of her poems was equally diverse; though most of her poems unsurprisingly focused on racial themes, she also read poems about her childhood, the Bible, music, ballroom dance, and math, to pick a few.
It was the last subject that seemed to surprise those present the most. She explained that she came from a family of scientists and mathematicians; she was the only member of her immediate family to venture into a career outside science and math. When asked why, she responded that she did like math and science, but she just happened to like poetry better.
Dove seemed intent on using up every minute of her allotted time. Yet more attendees of the lecture left to go to other classes as 1:45 approached. The crowd grew mildly restless and quite a few glazed expressions could be seen in the audience. Dove, perhaps drawing on her experience as a professor at the University of Virginia, trucked on. Around 1:30, one especially bored individual fell asleep and started snoring loudly. A wave of suppressed laughter moved through the crowd; Dove looked up sharply, but didn't miss a beat. The tone of her lecture changed dramatically after that.
Despite its length, though, the effect of the lecture on the assembled seemed to be generally a very positive one. "I thought Rita Dove was very nice to hear. It was interesting to listen to her read her poems herself – but maybe it was a bit too long," Freshman Craig Spencer said.
