Benjamin & Marian Schuster Performing Arts Center Videos
Bicentennial Symposium: Poetry & the American People
As part of the celebration of the Library of Congress Bicentennial in 2000, it sponsored the symposium Poetry and the American People: Reading, Voice and Publication in the 19th and 20th Centuries featuring a number of distinguished speakers followed by an evening reading by Robert Pinsky (U.S. Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry from 1997-2000) and W.S. Merwin (U.S. Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry from 2010-2011 and special Bicentennial Consultant from 1999-2000). In addition to Pinksy and Merwin, featured speakers included Rita Dove (U.S. Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry from 1993-95), Louise Glück (U.S. Poet Laureate from 2003-04), and Witter Bynner Fellows for 2000--Naomi Shihab Nye and Joshua Weiner.