One need look no further than memorials--from the most elaborate to the most humble--following the recent terrorist attacks, to see that people turn to poetry in times of crisis. W.H. Auden's "September 1, 1939" has been quoted extensively and passed from person to person over the Internet with an enthusiasm usually reserved for jokes and chain letters. While it is unusual to have four celebrity-driven poetry titles on the bestseller list--Best Loved Poems of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (Hyperion); Mattie Stepanek's two Heartsongs books (see p. 28); and U.S. poet laureate Billy Collins's Sailing Alone Around the Room (Random)--booksellers and publishers, for the most part, have not noticed a general rise in poetry sales to match that of nonfiction titles about the Middle East. Still, a few literary outposts have reported some backlist activity. At Elliot Bay Book Co. in Seattle, bookseller Peter Aaron is selling, in addition to Auden, books by "Neruda, Millay and Yeats. Also, Rumi and Hafiz, which is definitely tied in to people's interest in things Islamic and Middle Eastern."
One publisher, Beacon Press, is responding to Americans' need for the solace of verse with an instant book. Poems to Live by in Uncertain Times was been compiled by Beacon poet Joan Murray, whose memorial poem "Survivors--Found," received a great deal of attention and feedback when she read it on NPR a week after the World Trade Center and Pentagon strikes. Featuring an international list of contributors ranging from Nobel Prize-winner Czeslaw Milosz to Lucille Clifton, the anthology has been rushed to press for release in mid-December.
There is evidence that some readers may be turning to poetry to help make sense of Middle Eastern life. Charles Flowers, director of the Poetry Book Club of the Academy of American Poets, cited an unusually large demand for The Poetry of Arab Women: A Contemporary Anthology (Interlink Publishing Group), edited by Nathalie Handal. Offered in the club's September/October catalogue, it quickly established a pace of sales equivalent to the club's top seller, Seamus Heaney's Electric Light. Not long after September 11, Kashmiri-American poet Agha Shahid Ali's newest collection, Rooms Are Never Finished, was named a National Book Award finalist. W.W. Norton poetry editor Carol Smith believes that, in terms of increasing cultural awareness, "Ali does for Kashmir what Michael Ondaatje does for Sri Lanka," and, like all good poets, captures the "vulnerability of human beings, as well as their strengths."
Some poetry editors feel that recent events will have an enduring effect on the reception of poetry, and point to some new and forthcoming books that may gather added significance in the wake of the attacks. Deborah Garrison of Knopf argued that "poetry has always embodied the quest of all people to understand their lives. I think books that are career summations will resonate with readers--a selected volume by Marie Ponsot is scheduled for next spring. Also, a recent collection like Laurie Sheck's Black Series takes on new layers of meaning since September 11, for the way she addresses anxiety in the culture and what that has done to the human imagination."
W.W. Norton poetry editor Jill Bialoski concurs. She cited the crowds that have attended recent readings by Adrienne Rich (whose latest collection, Fox, came out in October). "A lot of people are tired of dispassion: poetry that speaks to large issues will be important. Rich has always stood for political activism, for understanding oppression, and there's more of a need for that now."
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