tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post4254342607050604231..comments2024-02-11T12:24:26.294-08:00Comments on The Compass Rose: Variations For Two PianosCurtis Favillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-57636084790500186802017-12-10T00:52:12.139-08:002017-12-10T00:52:12.139-08:00Dear Anon:
Thanks for the request.
I hadn't ...Dear Anon:<br /><br />Thanks for the request.<br /><br />I hadn't noticed this error.]<br /><br />Could it have been created by Spellcheck@ ?<br /><br />Donald must have turned over in his grave when he saw it!Curtis Favillehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-45437755131498038752017-12-03T19:30:10.720-08:002017-12-03T19:30:10.720-08:00Thanks so much for this wonderful commentary. Jus...Thanks so much for this wonderful commentary. Just so you know, however, you have accidentally inserted the word "of" in "all [of] Arkansas," which spoils the rhythm of the line. Would it be too much to ask you to amend this, since your site is the first one that comes up with a search of this particular Justice poem?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-13569974139456503922012-12-06T01:33:44.750-08:002012-12-06T01:33:44.750-08:00I was fortunate to know Dr. Thomas Higgins, person...I was fortunate to know Dr. Thomas Higgins, personally from the late 80's until his death in 1995, in St. Louis. I came to know him through two family members who were friends of mine. From what I knew of the gentleman, amd family discussions - Justice dedicated this piece to Tom out of genuine fondness and respect. Tom had been a child prodigy but sadly, due to bad timing, poor choices, fate or whatever you choose to call it - the full scope of his musical genius was never fully realized. Author Daniel Stern portrayed him as "Les Reilly" in his memoirs of life in 1930's Paris and Chicago, "What is What Was" A gracious and kind man, though not without a certain measure of inner demons, ego and self-defeating tendencies - my life was much the richer for having been able to call him friend. Anonymous - St. Louis, MOAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-52851496912124351522012-05-14T16:14:43.737-07:002012-05-14T16:14:43.737-07:00He compares birdsong to Mozart. That would be one...He compares birdsong to Mozart. That would be one example.Curtis Favillehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-28488649046709538472012-05-14T16:01:27.142-07:002012-05-14T16:01:27.142-07:00Is there any type of Figurative Language in this p...Is there any type of Figurative Language in this poem "Variations for Two Painos"?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-48415798327513073052010-02-14T10:07:18.804-08:002010-02-14T10:07:18.804-08:00Dear Mr. Holmes:
Very interesting.
Justice was...Dear Mr. Holmes:<br /><br />Very interesting. <br /><br />Justice was my poetry teacher at Iowa (Writers' Workshop) during the early 1970's. He was already--by that time--somewhat the grand old man of American academic poetry--though he was unfailingly humble and courteous in his approach to student work.<br /><br />The Variations has always been one of my favorites of Justice's work. I can rarely find anything wrong with Justice any poem, though occasionally I feel his revisions (later versions) to be mistaken.<br /><br />I too compose. My maternal grandmother was a graduate of Oberlin, and a voice teacher in the 1920's and 1930's. I don't often think of voice in composition, but I've tried making a few things. My latest idea is to set Tennessee Williams's "Which is My Little Boy"--do you know it? (I discovered Lee Hoiby had already made a version, which I've never seen or heard.) <br /><br />I think Justice probably spent a lot of time at the piano during his life, but had given up composition in favor of writing. He also wrote the libretto for an opera on the theme of the Death of Lincoln, a printed version of which I own. <br /><br />I mostly compose jazz piano, or pieces for classical guitar.Curtis Favillehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-72019293229442728012010-02-14T09:35:56.100-08:002010-02-14T09:35:56.100-08:00I composed a musical setting of this poem. When I...I composed a musical setting of this poem. When I wrote to him for permission to do so, I received it; but he was also curious about my musical intentions. It turns out that he studied music with Carl Ruggles before turning to poetry. He said that Higgins had been a good friend (in fact, he had died at about the same time as my request for permission to compose the music.) But he had been denied tenure at the college. Evidently the president felt he was too radical; Justice thought the Higgins' main offense was wearing a beret when it rained. Justice said that Higgins also had a death mask of Chopin, that that he couldn't figure out a way to put it into the poem. I enjoyed a couple of meetings with Donald and his wife Jean when they visited this area (the West Coast.) He returned to composing shortly before he died and sent me several of his new pieces.<br /><br />Brian Holmes<br />horncabbage(a)aol.comAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-42376930402944896172009-02-11T13:31:00.000-08:002009-02-11T13:31:00.000-08:00Married to the same woman all his adult life. The...Married to the same woman all his adult life. They had one son, Nathaniel.<BR/><BR/>No idea about extracurricular.<BR/><BR/>Read his poem "The Telephone Number of the Muse."Curtis Favillehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-77685682501040866762009-02-11T12:11:00.000-08:002009-02-11T12:11:00.000-08:00Did he have a love life?Did he have a love life?Kirby Olsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05952289700191142943noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-4326682357959756942009-02-11T11:06:00.000-08:002009-02-11T11:06:00.000-08:00No bios that I know of. He led a life of quiet de...No bios that I know of. <BR/><BR/>He led a life of quiet desperation, as the saying goes, or of quiet serenity. <BR/><BR/>Most of his adult life teaching poetry and English in colleges and universities. <BR/><BR/>He also translated some, from the French and Spanish. Guillevic. Alberti. <BR/><BR/>I had a class with Justice at Iowa in the early 1970's. He was very precise, quick to find amusement, slyly deprecating on occasion. <BR/><BR/>I think he thought I was patronizing him a little by writing poems that were rather like his, in style, at that time.Curtis Favillehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-31667291813839588532009-02-11T10:56:00.000-08:002009-02-11T10:56:00.000-08:00The poem might be sarcastic, as if to say, here wa...The poem might be sarcastic, as if to say, here was this guy, who thought he was God's gift to music, and now that he's gone, there's no music in the whole state.<BR/><BR/>I looked up T. Higgins, and there are some books on Chopin's piano pieces, and some other stuff that might relate.<BR/><BR/>Justice died in 2004, so I guess that now we will not have a poem by him about us, unless there's one in a drawer about you. He has lots of poems to dancers and pianists, it seems to me. <BR/><BR/>Also, lots of formal poems: villanelles, etc.<BR/><BR/>In the Reader, there is a ten-page piece called Piano Lessons: Notes on a Provincial Culture, he is writing about the little Bohemias of America, and the people who make up these Bohemias. I think now that his poem to the guy in Ladora was hello to another person in a tiny Bohemian bubble of late-night reading.<BR/><BR/>He grew up in Miami and studied with a Madame L... among others. He says if he started a little earlier he would have liked to have been a pianist.<BR/><BR/>Poem called On a Woman of Spirit who Taught both Piano and Dance he's again circulating this motif. He writes about it many of his poems, such as The Pupil, and Piano Teachers.<BR/><BR/>It seems to have opened a magic space for him. He says as much.<BR/><BR/>Is there a biography where we could sort out his relationship to Higgins?Kirby Olsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05952289700191142943noreply@blogger.com