Name: Adrienne Rich declines the National Medal of Arts, 1997 by brainpicker
Duration: 2 min 36 s
Description: The celebrated poet reads the seminal letter of political protest, in which she became the first and only person to date to refuse the highest honor bestowed upon an artist on behalf of the people. Background and discussion: http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2013/05/16/adrienne-rich-national-medal-of-arts-letter/

Poem text and context: https://www.brainpickings.org/2021/05/28/emily-dickinson-grief/

POEM TEXT / CONTEXT

"I measure every Grief I meet" (Maria Popova reads Emily Dickinson)

Poem text and context: https://www.themarginalian.org/2022/01/03/let-them-not-say-jane-hirshfields/

Photograph: Maria Popova

Music: Claude Debussy "Sonata for Cello and Piano in D minor - I. Prologue" (public domain)

"Let Them Not Say" by Jane Hirshfield, read by Krista Tippett

inspired by 
"To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.—Soft you now!
The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd."
Hamlet, Act III, Scene I
William Shakespeare

to sleep; perchance to dream

Context and illustrations: https://www.themarginalian.org/2022/11/10/love-at-first-sight-szymborska-queirazza/

CONTEXT

"Love at First Sight" by Wisława Szymborska (read by Maria Popova)

Poem text and context: https://www.themarginalian.org/2023/02/12/meditation-in-sunlight-may-sarton-amanda-palmer

"Meditation in Sunlight" by May Sarton (read by Amanda Palmer)

Poem text and context: https://www.themarginalian.org/2023/05/20/ada-limon-dead-stars/

Music: Bach Cello Suite No. 4 in E Flat, performed by Seraband Bourree (public domain)

"Dead Stars" by Ada Limón

Die 9 Symphonien

Beethoven - Symphony No. 1 in C major, Op. 21 - Claudio Abbado

Background, context, and poem text: http://www.brainpickings.org/2015/05/28/keeping-quiet-sylvia-boorstein-reads-pablo-neruda

Excerpted from https://soundcloud.com/onbeing/what-we-nurture-with-sylvia

MORE / POEM TEXT

Sylvia Boorstein reads "Keeping Quiet" by Pablo Neruda

My favorite piano piece was erased when my credit card expired.
Listen and enjoy..youtube.com/watch?v=Y1tkY_FmWDA

Concerto for Piano #4

Poem text and context: https://www.brainpickings.org/2018/04/02/meryl-streep-morning-song-sylvia-plath/

Recorded at Poetry & the Creative Mind 2014, hosted by The Academy of American Poets.

Meryl Streep reads "Morning Song" by Sylvia Plath

The celebrated poet reads the seminal letter of political protest, in which she became the first and only person to date to refuse the highest honor bestowed upon an artist on behalf of the people. Background and discussion: http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2013/05/16/adrienne-rich-national-medal-of-arts-letter/

Adrienne Rich declines the National Medal of Arts, 1997

brainpicker

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