Post by josephst112 on May 30, 2013 22:04:06 GMT -5
Billy Collins was born in 1941, in New York, to William and Katherine Collins. Being an only child, his mother paid much attention to him as she quit her job to raise him. His mother had the ability to recite verses on almost any subject and she would recite these to Billy; it is she who first introduced him to the world of words. When he was only seven years old, Billy had his first literary connection to a sailboat that he saw of the East River in NY “and that’s when” his poetry career “began”.
Over the years he has had many influences for his poetry. In the 1950’s he was influenced by the Beats movement as it was relevant to him since the rebellious teens were those who he went to school with during his adolescent years. His father introduced him to Poetry Magazine, where contemporary poets like Karl Shapiro, Howard Nemerov and Reed Whittemore influenced the way that he constructed his poems. Later, when he was receiving his Ph.D in English from the University of California, Riverside, Billy set a goal that he wanted to be regarded as a third rate Wallace Stevens since he attempted to write exactly like him. Billy’s poetry had many influences, the most important being his mother who introduced him to the wonders of words. If she had held back, the world would have been deprived of a great writer, but luckily for us, she did not.
It is these influences that shape what he includes in his poems today. As he read through the poems of the 19th century, Billy saw lots of humor in poetry, which led him to incorporate humor into his own poems. He believes that humor is a vital inclusion in his poetry as it is a “necessary ingredient” to the poem; being just as important as seriousness in poems. His humor is what defines his poems, it is what makes them stand out over others. Whether he writes about Smokey the Bear setting the forest ablaze, or the weights of humans on other planets, he always knows how to incorporate humor in order to give the reader a good laugh while also getting his point across.
He also never hides his opinions from the reader as “he allows us to overhear, clearly, what he himself has discovered." These discoveries exemplify who Billy is as a person as they reveal what he believes about certain topics. Some of which being that he is an “average” man who “wants to water ski across the surface of a poem” while “failing to see the attraction” of planetarium scales. It is opinions like these that are a staple to his poems as they give the readers the pleasure and insight of viewing an aspect of the world through the eyes of Billy Collins.
With thirteen poetry collections like, Nine Horses and The Art of Drowning, and countless awards like the Mark Twain Award for Humor in Poetry, there's no question as to why he has been given the title, “the most popular poet in America”; it is well deserved. While his poems are opinionated, he manages to see eye to eye with lots of readers as his last three books have published over 100,000 copies each. His humor is a great treat for all readers as it adds a lighter side to his poems. Now that you all know about this magnificent poet and all of his accomplishments, it is time for me to stop spoiling him for you and let the man himself do the talking. Ladies and Gentlemen it is my honor to introduce to you, a man even greater than a third rate Wallace Stevens, Mr. Billy Collins.
Word Count-629
Over the years he has had many influences for his poetry. In the 1950’s he was influenced by the Beats movement as it was relevant to him since the rebellious teens were those who he went to school with during his adolescent years. His father introduced him to Poetry Magazine, where contemporary poets like Karl Shapiro, Howard Nemerov and Reed Whittemore influenced the way that he constructed his poems. Later, when he was receiving his Ph.D in English from the University of California, Riverside, Billy set a goal that he wanted to be regarded as a third rate Wallace Stevens since he attempted to write exactly like him. Billy’s poetry had many influences, the most important being his mother who introduced him to the wonders of words. If she had held back, the world would have been deprived of a great writer, but luckily for us, she did not.
It is these influences that shape what he includes in his poems today. As he read through the poems of the 19th century, Billy saw lots of humor in poetry, which led him to incorporate humor into his own poems. He believes that humor is a vital inclusion in his poetry as it is a “necessary ingredient” to the poem; being just as important as seriousness in poems. His humor is what defines his poems, it is what makes them stand out over others. Whether he writes about Smokey the Bear setting the forest ablaze, or the weights of humans on other planets, he always knows how to incorporate humor in order to give the reader a good laugh while also getting his point across.
He also never hides his opinions from the reader as “he allows us to overhear, clearly, what he himself has discovered." These discoveries exemplify who Billy is as a person as they reveal what he believes about certain topics. Some of which being that he is an “average” man who “wants to water ski across the surface of a poem” while “failing to see the attraction” of planetarium scales. It is opinions like these that are a staple to his poems as they give the readers the pleasure and insight of viewing an aspect of the world through the eyes of Billy Collins.
With thirteen poetry collections like, Nine Horses and The Art of Drowning, and countless awards like the Mark Twain Award for Humor in Poetry, there's no question as to why he has been given the title, “the most popular poet in America”; it is well deserved. While his poems are opinionated, he manages to see eye to eye with lots of readers as his last three books have published over 100,000 copies each. His humor is a great treat for all readers as it adds a lighter side to his poems. Now that you all know about this magnificent poet and all of his accomplishments, it is time for me to stop spoiling him for you and let the man himself do the talking. Ladies and Gentlemen it is my honor to introduce to you, a man even greater than a third rate Wallace Stevens, Mr. Billy Collins.
Word Count-629