The latest issue of Dunes Review includes both my first poem published in print since undergrad and my brother Sam Linstrom's first print publication, which is this image that he made in response to the poem. You can order a copy of this Winter/Spring 2018 issue here, and you can see my poem and Sam's illustration as they appear further down in this post. I've already begun to tear into some of the other work in this issue, and there's some good stuff.
Inside Your Mouth, 2018, by Sam Linstrom, b. 1992
Very happy to share news of the publication of three poems in Narrative Northeast's "Eco Issue," alongside such poetic heroes as Camille Dungy and Kwame Dawes. You can read my small contribution here (preferably on a full screen, for best formatting with the image). Even better, my pieces are accompanied by this lovely illustration by my brother Sam Linstrom! His work is amazing and you should follow him on Twitter!
Soot, 2018, by Sam Linstrom, b. 1992
I'm very happy to announce the publication of my poem "What was Precious" in Valparaiso Poetry Review. You can read the poem here, and listen to my reading of it here.
Cover art (Superb Sunbird, 1991, by Robert Lostutter, b. 1931) for issue XIX.1 of Valparaiso Poetry Review
The semester is not only in full swing, but has somehow entered midterm season. I am in my first semester of neither teaching nor coursework as I plow through (more like dig around in) my first dissertation chapter. My current task has largely involved synthesizing Liberty Hyde Bailey’s vast and diverse work and making it legible to literary studies and ecocriticism. My advice to friends is not to ask too pointedly about how it’s going — the first chapter (so I’m told) is often the hardest to get done. Turns out the genre of the dissertation is tricky, and the stakes feel high. In the meantime, I’ve had the pleasure of collaborating on a couple projects in media other than writing.
I had the pleasure to participate in two conferences this summer: the weeklong writers' conference Bread Loaf Orion at the Bread Loaf Mountain Campus of Middlebury College in Vermont, and the biennial conference of ASLE, the Association for the Study of Literature and Environment, in Detroit.
I'm spending the summer getting back into Liberty Hyde Bailey and also writing and researching toward the first chapter of my dissertation. I'll be regularly posting my findings at this new Medium blog, as I explain in this first post. Check it out!
I am pleased to say that this summer I'll be joining a flock of writers whose work variously engages with the “environment,” place, and ecology at the Bread Loaf Orion Environmental Writers’ Conference at the Bread Loaf Campus of Middlebury College in Ripton, VT, from June 3-9.
I had the great pleasure of being interviewed on Earth Day this year by Marcus Smith for his radio show / podcast Thinking Aloud about Liberty Hyde Bailey and his book The Holy Earth, the centennial edition of which I edited this year in collaboration with Wendell Berry, who wrote the foreword. You can listen to the interview, which spans Bailey's personal story from childhood on the farm to founding Dean of the College of Agriculture at Cornell, as well as my personal story about how Bailey changed my life (and the way I look at apples, among other things), here.
On Tuesday, April 19, I was joined by professors Jim Tantillo and Scott Peters of Cornell to participate on a panel discussing the significance of Liberty Hyde Bailey's environmental manifesto, The Holy Earth, and the centennial edition which I edited.
This week I'll be visiting friends at the Liberty Hyde Bailey Museum to give a book talk about the recently released centennial edition of Bailey's environmental manifesto, The Holy Earth, which I edited and for which Wendell Berry contributed a foreword. You can join us on Saturday, January 9, at 12:00 noon at the Liberty Hyde Bailey Museum, 922 S. Bailey Ave., South Haven, MI 49090.
Facebook event here. More info below.