A few years back, I received an email from Christopher Buckley requesting permission to reprint a review I’d written in an anthology of work by and about the late poet Larry Levis. I was thrilled to share what I’d written many years earlier for Poet Lore, a literary magazine in the Washington DC area. I’d read Levis’ collection of poems, The Widening Spell of the Leaves and fell in love with his poetry. My review was titled, “Heart in the Presence of Oblivion,” a title whose meaning deepened not many years later with the unexpected early death of the poet.

When I saw the result of Christopher and his co-editor Alexander Long’s work, a 663-page anthology, I was grateful and very impressed. A Condition of the Spirit: The Life and Work of Larry Levis, published by Eastern Washington University Press in 2004, is filled with reviews and essays by poets such as Philip Levine, Charles Wright, Diane Wakoski, and Stephen Dunn. (To read the table of contents in A Condition of the Spirit, visit University of Washington Press). What a gift, I thought, to learn more about a poet whose work moved me by reading what other poets wrote about his work and reading what Levis himself wrote about poetry. And how marvelous and astonishing to be included, to learn that what I’d written carried weight amidst much other writing about the poet.

I contacted Christopher for an interview to learn more about the inspiration for this anthology and the editors’ hopes for it. It should not surprise us that as an anthologist, Christopher’s answers to my many questions are thorough and filled with book titles and names of many poets and writers; the privilege of hearing from Christopher Buckley on the birth of A Condition of the Spirit is not only an opportunity to learn more about the work and life of Larry Levis, but also an opportunity to learn about a whole school of poets and an opportunity to gain appreciation for the work of anthologists and their dedication to collecting, preserving and disseminating information.

If you are not familiar with Levis’ poetry or you want to hear again the music and strength in his poems, visit any of several Internet sites to read a sampling of his poetry. The American Academy of Poets includes “The Widening Spell of the Leaves” and five other poems on their site.  PoemHunter.com includes more than 20 poems by Levis. Three more poems are available at ars poetica, and The LA Poetry Festival site includes “The Cop,” a poem dedicated to Philip Levine. “Elegy with a Thimbleful of Water in the Cage” and “The Space” are reprinted at Blackbird.

Sheila
Did you know Larry Levis?

Christopher
Yes, for many years. I was not near as close to him as many, folks who went through Fresno State University in the late 1960s and early 70s, people like David St. John, Bruce Boston, all of whom studied writing there with Philip Levine and Peter Everwine. But I met Larry through the Fresno connection. One of Levine’s early students who was in classes with Larry, Glover Davis, was my first workshop teacher at San Diego State in the early ‘70s. Glover introduced me to Levine and Everwine and Levis, first off from that Fresno anthology, Down at the Santa Fe Depot. Larry knew my work from The Missouri Review for which he was poetry editor. He was gracious enough to publish a couple of my poems there. I had Larry out to read at Orange Coast Community College in ’77 when I was a part-time instructor there. We also met up in Fresno on a couple of his visits back in ’79 and ’80 when I was teaching there part-time. Mainly, I remember an afternoon in the early ‘80s at the MLA in Los Angeles. I think Larry and I spent an hour or two talking at the bar in the Biltmore in the dead part of the afternoon when most people were up in the small rooms doing job interviews. I had no interviews and had gone there just to visit with people like Larry and Charles Wright that year. That was a very memorable afternoon for me as I had Larry all to myself to talk poetry for a while; even then he was one of a handful of my favorite poets. He was his poetry — candid, direct, and symphonic all at the same time. I still remember asking a dumb-kid question of him after the second glass of bad Chablis, “What are you trying to do in your poetry?” And he answered without hesitation, “I’m trying to stop Time.” That answer seemed true and important to me as it was one of my main aims as well, though unarticulated to that point; so the light went on. Years following, I would call Larry when working on a project for which I needed his help. I was editing the book on Philip Levine for the University of Michigan’s Under Discussion series and asked Larry if he would write something for the book. The result was his essay, “Philip Levine,” which is one of the best and most entertaining essays I know about the education of the poet and the value of a true and brilliant teacher. It is in the Michigan Levine book of course and also in A Condition of the Spirit, and it is partially reprinted in The Gazer Within, a volume in the University of Michigan’ Poets on Poetry series. Just two weeks before his death, Larry called and we talked about another project I was putting together for which he had agreed to write something. He mentioned then that he had pretty much finished up a new book; that book was Elegy, which Levine edited after Larry’s death.

Sheila
What was your connection to his work?

 Christopher
Well, I was just a fan from the get-go. The connection of course is through “The Fresno School” of poets, especially that group that studied with Philip Levine and Peter Everwine in the late 1960s and 1970s — they were the first poets I read; my first poetry teacher came from there; personal friends such at Jon Veinberg and Gary Soto and Ernesto Trejo and Luis Omar Salinas — among many more — were part of that school. Besides Down at the Santa Fe Depot (1970), there were two other poetry anthologies of the Fresno poets. One was Piecework: 19 Fresno Poets, (1987); this is out of print now and it was a project put together by Soto, Trejo and Veinberg with Trejo and Veinberg editing. More recently, How Much Earth: The Fresno Poets (2001) was edited by David Oliveira, M.L. Williams and myself. Oliveira was a student in those early classes with Larry at Fresno State and Marty Willimas was a later student of Levine’s. This project is still in print and is the most inclusive, collecting 50 or more poets. Larry’s poems were central to all of these anthologies.

The publication of a new Levis book was a poetic event for me, something I looked forward to every few years. I bought everything I could find by Larry — copies of magazines with his essays and poems in them as well as books. I have letterpress, limited edition books as a result of staying on top of what he was publishing. I knew the poems, the poetics, the prose in his award winning book, Black Freckles. A few years ago, I met a student of my first teacher Glover Davis, and she was going home to Iowa. She was good enough to make a Xerox of Larry’s PhD thesis of poems, Signs, from the library stacks there; that book was never published as a book, though a lot of the poems from it appeared in the next two books. There is not much in contemporary poetry I value more than Larry’s work

Sheila
What is the impact of Levis’ work on yours?

Christopher
His work opened up the possibilities of the imagination and language for me and for my students. I can still remember the first time I read “Rhododendrons” — from Larry’s second book, The Afterlife — and came across the move in which Larry goes back up to a younger version of himself: “I want to turn back and go up / to myself at age 20, / and press five dollars into his hand / so he can sleep. / While he stands trembling on a street in Fresno / suddenly one among many in the crowd / that strolls down Fulton Street, / among the stores that are closing, / and is never heard of again.” I realized that that kind of imagination – – the audacity of the move, the specificity of its context, the clear inclination to surrender the ego to the concept of the poem was what I had always wanted and had been unable to come up with. I was, as we used to say, “blown-away.” Larry’s imagination and its concrete underpinnings usually took an image, a scene, three steps beyond where most good poets would have left it.

And as his work developed he was able to weave more subjects, more themes, more incidents into one inclusive, symphonic whole. I think of poems like “Caravaggio: Swirl & Vortex” which deals with, among many things, the Vietnam war and war memorial; the loss of his friend Zamora in that war; the life of Caravaggio; the life of art; the senselessness of war and early death. And of course he developed a longer syntactical rhythm that would accommodate his voice, the candid asides that qualified his subjects and eliminated any self-pity or importance. His voice was absolutely authentic and compelling — a big voice that spoke softly, thoughtfully. Absolutely startling and legitimate, never strained. One of a kind.

Sheila
How did the idea of doing such a volume occur to you?

Christopher
The reasons for doing such a book were obvious to me — Larry’s poetic genius, his tragic and early death. Not yet 50, and Larry died of cardiac arrest in May, 1996. He was a gifted and consummate man of letters. Poetically, he was a genius. Larry was one of the two or three poets who were the best of their generation, that group of poets say twenty years in back of the most senior poets in America. The other one who comes immediately to mind, easily a genius as well, is Bill Matthews, and we lost them both within a few years of each other, just on either side of 50.

Larry’s was a singular voice and vision and it kept developing book by book. His work was admired by so many, his early loss demanded a book or books that would preserve his gift and work for others. Simply by looking at the table of contents in A Condition of the Spirit: the Life and Work of Larry Levis, anyone can see how many poets and readers of poetry admired the work and the man. In an interview I conducted with Philip Levine (and there is no one’s poetry or poetic intelligence I admire and trust more) for Quarterly West in the Winter 96/97 issue, Levine said about Larry: “I think he was easily the best poet of his generation, at times I truly believe he was writing the best poems in the country. Many of the poets I’ve talked to since his death feel the same way.”

And, while Larry received book publication prizes, NEAs and a Guggenheim, he was, by comparison to his talent, “overlooked.” Why is he left out of the Norton anthology? Why did Poulin and subsequent editors not include his work in Contemporary American Poetry, the Houghton Mifflin anthology? Those two anthologies are arguably the most visible and representative. Poetry politics, networking, political correctness — all of that left no room for a talent as transcendent and important as Larry’s. So it was a project crying out to be done; it took no original thinking to see that readers of poetry over the last thirty years would expect and respond to a volume that was a testament to his life and writing. Also, there is a tradition of this type of book in contemporary poetry, largely manifest in the University of Michigan’s Under Discussion Series — books that collect the critical response to a major poet’s work over the years.

Sheila
Did you model your anthology on these books?

Christopher
Yes, but with Larry, my co-editor Alexander Long and I wanted to do more. In addition to collecting and selecting the response to his poetry, we solicited other critical essays from poets more than eager to contribute their view of his accomplishment. Beyond this, there were many poets who wanted to speak to Larry’s life as a poet, how he made his work, his influence as a teacher and friend, his influence simply as someone who wrote a singular poetry. And so there is the initial section of memoirs about Larry’s life, loving tributes from Philip Levine, Peter Everwine, Stephen Dunn, Marcia Southwick and more. The middle section of the book is comprised of Larry’s essays on poetry, those not already contained in the Michigan Book, The Gazer Within. Larry was also the author of an award winning book of prose, Black Freckles, and while some of the pieces there line up with fabulist fiction or the surreal tradition, there are a number of heart-breaking lyrical pieces that are truly more creative nonfiction than anything and which again illuminate the writing life of the poet, and we wanted to include those. Larry was a marvel, writer of many interests and talents, one who never pushed himself forward; always, he let the work stand on its own. For instance, while many know Larry worked in the international translation program at Iowa while he was completing his PhD — largely translating the Spanish and South American poets — few knew, as Alex Long discovered, that Larry also contributed translations to an anthology of a contemporary Japanese poet: Responses Magnetic by Kijima Jajime.

With all the varying camps in poetry, with its egos and contentiousness, it is difficult to have a group of poets agree about the achievement of any one poet. Larry was the exception, in my experience. I was never in a group of poets where there was not unanimous acclaim for his poetry — its poignancy and humanity, its inventiveness and importance. Clearly, a testament was needed to this exceptional and wide-ranging life and work.

Sheila
How did you choose Alexander Long as your co-editor, and how did his involvement with the project help you?

Christopher
Sixteen, seventeen years ago he was my student when I was teaching at a state college in the east. Like most, he struggled for the first year or so to make a good complete poem; but when I showed him Larry’s work, that seemed to be all it took. The example of Larry’s unflinching introspection and the true, jazz-like but calm evaluation of the rush of experience set Alex off on his own road. He is one of the finest young poets I know or have read in the last many years. The first time he sent off work, to a reasonably sized literary magazine contest, he won and had several poems published. I told him it would not always be that easy. And unfortunately, I was right. Alex now has two extraordinary manuscripts going around that some publisher should snap up? They do not sound like Larry, they do not sound like anyone but Alex. So, I was a great teacher. What had I done? Simply put Levis into his hands.

So, knowing Alex knew Larry’s work so well, knowing he loved it, I asked him to help me out. I knew he would have kept an eye out for reviews and essays over the years and might well know some I might have missed. He also has more computer and Internet skills than I and could do a few searches to be sure we had not missed anything. Usually in my anthology projects, I find the book benefits from a co-editor. Even though I think up the idea, make the contacts for publishing, and develop the strategy and most of the contents page, it helps to have another perspective and set of contacts in the world. For instance, Alex came up with Larry’s translations of Kijima Jajime, which no one seemed to know about.

Sheila
What is the impact on you of collecting all of this material?

Christopher
I was much older when it was published than when I began putting the project together. Seriously, there were no surprises really, other than discovering how many people valued Larry’s work. I had always had this immense respect for, and appreciation of, his poetry and his prose on poetry and this work just deepened that. Gandhi said something very close to, “The little thing you do will not be important, but it is important that you do it.” So, in a way, I feel good having done the little that I could. Certainly Larry’s work is important, and so my hope is that this book will be a fairly comprehensive testament to his work and that it will be important. It was the right thing to do, for Larry’s memory and work. For me personally, there are no real outcomes and rewards as a result; these kinds of books are not best sellers, but I think they matter and are helpful. The book had the result of any hard and sustained work — the satisfaction in seeing a worthy project into the world, one from which anyone interested in poetry may well benefit.

Sheila
Have you made richer contact with other writers? Learned more than you knew about the work and life of the poet?

Christopher
Yes, sure — you could not help but make more and richer contacts with other writers in a project this size (663 pages). I should say right off that this project and others relating to Larry would not be at all possible without the kind help of Larry’s sister Sheila Brady. She gave, and gives, generously of her time and does her best to keep Larry’s work available. I’d also add that in addition to making contacts with those who have pieces already written, you enrich and enlarge the scope of the project by working with other poets and writers who are willing to write essays especially for the book. I think of Dave Smith’s terrific essay, which is evaluation and memoir, a wonderful piece that was not in the world prior to this endeavor. The only poem in the book is right at the start — a loving tribute/elegy for Larry by Gerald Stern, one of our best.

And of course you learn a lot more about Larry’s poetry by finding and reading so many brilliant reviews and appreciations of his work. The book has many critical responses that widen a reader’s appreciation and understanding; David Young’s “Reading Larry Levis” one of the foremost essays among many outstanding ones. And reading the first section of the book, you learn a lot more about Larry the person, the person who was the writer in the many fine reminiscences — Levine’s, Everwine’s, Costanzo’s, Marcia Southwick’s, and Ed Ochesters, to name just a few.

Sheila
Has the experience of producing this anthology affected your own work?

Christopher
Have I altered my writing? Not in the sense you’re asking, I think; i.e. my own writing has not been changed now or influenced by putting this book together. I love Larry’s poetry and wish I could write that well, with that much soul and vision, but I have been wise enough to not try and imitate him. One’s writing is in fact altered in that you don’t get to do very much of it, or certainly not as much as you would like or feel you should, when you engage in a book of this length and scope. The time to work on it has to come from somewhere, so what you give up is your own free time that would otherwise have gone into your own work. That seems fairly obvious.

Sheila
Any more anthologies in the works?

Christopher
I have ideas for one or two more anthologies; I’m just completing an anthology of poems entitled Homage to Vallejo, a collection of poems by American poets influenced by Vallejo, taking off from the great example of Donald Justice. I’m also floating the idea of a collection of prose poems set in California, somewhat in the tradition of The Geography of Home, which I edited with Gary Young. But overall, feel these days I am running out of time and energy for them. I always come up with ideas, but perhaps five anthologies is enough.

Sheila
Tell me about the process of creating this anthology.

Christopher
The cliché tells us to write what you know. It helps then, given the time you will have to give up, to take on a project whose subject you know well. Over the years, I had been collecting and making mental notes about Larry’s work, and the work about Larry’s work. So to begin I had probably a third of the pieces in hand, or knew where to find them, or knew from whom I wanted something. Pulling Alex in was a big help as he did a computer search at his university library and we both put the word out and people recommended friends with work, pointed us to other pieces we might have missed or which appeared in journals very late into the project. Know the territory. Keep files and notes. I have no secret techniques for this gathering part of the job. This is work, pure and simple. Also, as I’ve said elsewhere, Mary Flinn of the New Virginia Review was very helpful. She published a special issue in tribute to Larry and a number of the reminiscences we used Mary was kind enough to let us reprint from her issue.

It took about two years to get everything together, and then of course there were four or five last minute additions, for which we were very thankful. You think you are done, have it put to bed, then something else comes to light.

We were lucky with Christopher Howell and Scott Poole at Eastern Washington University Press; they were very patient and tolerant of additions, agreeable to add more in.

I found EWU Press by just wearing down the odds, writing to small and university presses. Initially, I had an editor who accepted if for another university press, but then she left the press and they did not want to follow through on her project. I thought it was a natural for the University of Pittsburgh Press, but the Director turned it down for reasons that to me escaped all logic and their own best interest? She said they would feel awkward about publishing a book promoting a poet they published. Go figure? You can count on nothing. I just happened to mention the project to an assistant editor at EWU Press while writing to them on another project of mine and Chris Howell got back to me immediately as he is a big fan of Larry’s and they just happened to have a publication slot open. I got lucky. You have to have luck these days regardless of the importance or worthiness of your project.

Once I had Sheila Brady’s permission, there were really no hurdles. It takes time to gather the material, you have to write for permissions; you have to wrangle some fees — work through all the usual suspects in assembling an anthology. Steady work, and it finally is a book. EWU Press was helpful and supported the project throughout.

Sheila
How will the book be used, do you think?

Christopher
My hope is that it becomes adopted for MFA seminars on and workshops in contemporary poetry. I see it being used in undergraduate classes as well, especially as Larry is such an important figure in the last quarter of the 20th century and as some of his essays really document the poetic “scene” in the 1970s. So it has an historical value as well as an aesthetic one. I see lots of folks picking it up for just the pleasure of the text — because they like and admire Larry and his work, they will just enjoy reading about him and reading his prose on poetry.

Sheila
How would you suggest students of poetry and writing use the book?

Christopher
I’d suggest they read it largely in the order it is presented. I think Section I’s memoirs about Larry will reveal the person and the writer as well. Those many loving tributes have to make a reader feel close to the subject. But perhaps before the second section, I’d suggest checking out the three interviews, as they may well reinforce the transition between the man and the work. Section II is all Larry, and the range of the essays there is wide, but you come away with a good notion of how he thinks about poetry. The third section is the longest and to some extent it moves chronologically, so the student of poetry and Larry’s work can find responses to particular books they are interested in, though there are several comprehensive essays that cover just about all the work. And of course, the epilogue — a piece of what I see as creative nonfiction by Larry from Black Freckles, which is so very close to his poetry and which is a haunting emblem of absence.

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In today’s publishing environment, funding for anthologies is limited because publishers don’t believe the paying market for them is large enough. Thank goodness for libraries and universities, then, who recognize the value in such endeavors and whose support must certainly keep whatever funding is available flowing. Thank goodness for the dedicated anthology editor, who believes in the importance of collecting writings that appeared in periodicals so that the earnest student can access a whole world at once.