Tuesday, April 20, 2010

News at Eleven: Q: Did you have to work to find

that conversational voice or did that come naturally?

A: It took decades to find. My first book was published when I was in my 40s. Prior to that, the problem was, I was sending poems out, but I really wasn't publishable because I was badly imitating. I hadn't figured something out, which I think anyone with a fresh voice either figures out or it comes about by trial and error, and that is how to combine a number of influences--maybe six or 10 of them actually--how to combine them in such a way that they're not recognizable.

from Press Democrat: Two-time U.S. poet laureate Billy Collins comes to the Wells Fargo Center

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