Bill Keller talks politics and poetry in the Aug 12th, 2011 Sunday edition of the New York Times Magazine in “I Yield My Time to the Gentleman in Stratford-Upon-Avon.”
A brief snippet:
“The dire economy seems to make the participants keener than ever to think ‘out of the box’ in the way poetry encourages,” he [Professor Filreis] told me. Which brings me to Congress, an institution stuck deeper inside the box than just about any other these days. You have probably heard that up on Capitol Hill, they’re very big on prayer breakfasts, where members gather over scrambled eggs and ask God for wisdom. You can judge from the agonizing debt spectacle we’ve watched this summer how well that’s working. Well, maybe it’s time to add some poetry readings to the agenda.”