Tribute to Elizabeth Bishop

Presented by Eric Karpeles and Melissa Smith

The embrace of Elizabeth Bishop’s modest but exacting body of work into the canon of English literature continues unimpeded. In her lifetime (1911-1979) she was admired and celebrated, acclaimed by fellow poet John Ashbery as “a writer’s writer’s writer,” but it is only since her death that her influence on the literary arts of her time has been fully recognized. A troubled life was marked by struggle and pain, while her inspirited poetry was painstakingly crafted by determination and integrity.

Painter and writer Eric Karpeles presents this talk about Bishop as a celebration at the end of her centenary year, discussing her work, her life, and the world through which she moved. Integrated into Karpeles’s talk, actress Melissa Smith reads poems and excerpts from Bishop’s stories and letters.

Eric Karpeles

Commonweal Board Member Eric Karpeles is a painter, author of Paintings in Proust, and translator of Proust’s Overcoat. A graduate of Haverford College, Oxford University, and The New School, he lived in France in the 1970s, holding fellowships both at la Cité des Arts in Paris and the Camargo Foundation in Cassis. Karpeles writes about painting and the intersection of literature and visual aesthetics. Find out more about Eric on his website.

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