This collection encompasses 50-plus years of interviews, readings, speeches, and reports on the vibrant literary scene in Minnesota. Not only home to giants F. Scott Fitzgerald and Sinclair Lewis, our state has an array of incredible contemporary poets, novelists and playwrights. Their words make up majority of this collection.
Repeatedly being named the “Most Literate City in the United States,” the Twin Cities has played host to numerous visiting national writers via book tours, festivals, and lectures. Many recordings of these are also included.
This project was funded by the National Historical Publications & Records Commission.
June 10, 1973 - Part six of the MER documentary series, A Sense of Place. Program is titled “All the News that's Fit” and is a study of how journalism influenced regional feeling as the state grew.
June 17, 1973 - Part seven of the MER documentary series, A Sense of Place. Program is titled “More Than One Wilderness” and profiles living in Minnesota, from city to cabin.
June 21, 1973 - MPR’s Bill Siemering has a conversation with poet Thomas McGrath about poetry and politics. McGrath also reads his poetry.
June 21, 1973 - MPR’s Bill Siemering interviews poet Mark Vinz, editor of Dakota Territory. The interview is broken into three segments. Vinz talks about the use of regionalism in writing, young writers, and conflict/war. Vinz also reads numerous poems.
June 24, 1973 - Part eight of the MER documentary series, A Sense of Place. Program is titled “The New Doctor on Old Main Street” and discusses if physicians are being adequately prepared to live in small communities, as well as community reaction to them.
August 8, 1973 - MPR’s Bill Siemering interviews Midwestern poet Mark Vinz about regional poetry. Vinz reads his poems “Heartland, ”Line Storm,” and “First Summer: A Reckoning.”
August 8, 1973 - Poet Jim Moore provides commentary on why poets like Thomas McGrath and Robert Bly stay in this area, in part due to the connection between poetry and politics.
September 1, 1973 - Moorhead poet Mary Anne Pryor reads her poetry about the region.
September 1, 1973 - Minnesota poet Robert Bly lectures about the importance of reading poetry aloud, starting with Homer, and feeling poetry vs. knowing it.
September 6, 1973 - Poet Jim Moore compares Walt Whitman's "The Role of the Poet" with the poetry of Tom McGrath, specifically the "Letter to an Imaginary Friend." Moore reads aloud from both poems.