Over Eighty and Going Strong
These two poets are vibrant proof that as long as you are talented, energetic, and keep your wits and your fingers working, your writing career can just keep going.
Stephen
Stepanchev, now a Hastings-on-Hudson resident, has just published his 11th
collection, Beyond the Gate: New and Selected Poems (Orchises Press). It
contains 27 new poems and selections from all 10 previous collections. Born in
Serbia in 1915, he came to the U. S. in 1922 and grew up in Chicago. He taught
at Purdue University, joined the Army in 1941, and then taught at New York University
and Queens College, CUNY, until 1985. He served as Poet Laureate of Queens from
1997 - 2000.
Peter
Kane Dufault, now residing in a cabin he built in Columbia Co., NY, was born
in 1923 and grew up Westchester. His various jobs have included WW II bomber pilot,
tree surgeon, journalist, house-painter, musician and dance caller, teacher, and
“visiting critic” at Williams College. His books include New Things Come Into
the World (Lindisfarne Press, ‘93) and Looking In All Directions (Worple
Press, ‘00), and his poems have appeared in The New Yorker, Harper’s, The New
Republic, Atlantic, Spectator (in England) and in many other magazines and
anthologies including the recent Norton Anthology of Poetry. He is known
both in the U. S. and in England for reciting from memory rather than reading
from the page and has twice been poet-in-residence at the Cheltenham Literary
Festival in England.
Peter Kane Dufault photo by Ruth Tuoti
All readings include a question & answer period and a reception with books by the author(s) for sale.
Suggested
Donation: $5 ($3 for HVWC members and those under age 18)
The readings at the HVWC are made possible in part by a grant from the Bydale Foundation; the David G. Taft Foundation; the Orchard Foundation; and the Thendara Foundation; with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, a State Agency; and by Westchester Arts Council with funds from Westchester County Government, corporations and individuals.