Poetry: The Creative Process: Poets discuss Poems & Creativity – Details, episodes & analysis

How does art change the way we see and experience the world? Art has the power to offer transformative experiences, but what about the lives of artists who give so much of themselves? How can we balance creativity and personal well-being while still making work that is true and meaningful?

David Rubin (President of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences 2019-2022 · Casting Director) discusses the importance of fostering an international presence for the Motion Picture Academy. He highlights how inviting filmmakers from around the world has enriched the community and emphasizes the power of collaboration in the filmmaking industry.

Later, he reflects on his journey in casting, the challenges younger people face in finding their niche, and the importance of patience and open-mindedness in discovering one's career path. Rubin highlights how negative experiences can also be valuable learning points.

Jericho Brown (Pulitzer Prize-winning Poet: The Tradition · Editor of How We Do It: Black Writers on Craft, Practice, and Skill) shares his process of writing poetry, emphasizing the element of discovery and the unexpected directions a poem can take. He shares his advice to young poets, how they should aim to create original works that could become lasting cultural touchstones.

Julian Lennon (Singer-songwriter · Documentary Filmmaker · Founder of The White Feather Foundation · Photographer/Author of Life’s Fragile Moments) reflects on the emotional highs and lows experienced by creatives. He discusses the significance of finding balance and happiness through artistic and charitable expression.

Sam Levy (Award-winning Cinematographer of Lady Bird · Frances Ha · While We’re Young) explores the art of cinematography. Levy underscores the importance of intention in every scene, whether it’s to highlight a character’s emotions or to convey the unspoken elements of the story.

Julia F. Christensen (Neuroscientist - Author of The Pathway To Flow: The New Science of Harnessing Creativity to Heal and Unwind the Body & Mind) discusses transformative experiences through art and literature. She explains how aesthetic emotions can lead to profound changes in perception and understanding, drawing from both personal and scientific insights.

To hear more from each guest, listen to their full interviews.

Episode Website

www.creativeprocess.info/pod

Instagram:@creativeprocesspodcast

This episode explores the enduring power of storytelling to shape our world and illuminate the human experience. Writers Neil Gaiman, Ada Limón, Jericho Brown, E.J. Koh, Marge Piercy, and Max Stossel discuss creativity, resilience, and the power of words to heal and bring people together.

Neil Gaiman (Writer, Producer, Showrunner · The Sandman, American Gods, Good Omens, Coraline) explores the secret lives of writers, reflecting on the masks they wear in the pursuit of truth and beauty.

Jericho Brown (Pulitzer Prize-winning Poet: The Tradition · Editor of How We Do It: Black Writers on Craft, Practice, and Skill) shares “Foreday in the Morning”, highlighting the hard work and resilience in Black America. He examines the vernacular of his poetry and how it intertwines themes of race, nationality, and familial love.

Ada Limón (U.S. Poet Laureate · The Hurting Kind, The Carrying) presents an "apocalyptic love poem" that questions the intersection of despair and hope in today's changing world. She reflects deeply on the personal and universal struggles of finding beauty amidst environmental and existential crises.

Marge Piercy (Award-winning Novelist, Poet & Activist) delves into the emotional weight of words and memories, the terror of child separation, and the impending doom facing our world due to environmental destruction and political negligence.

E.J. Koh (Award-Winning Memoirist & Poet · The Magical Language of Others · A Lesser Love) recounts a haunting family history from Jeju Island in Korea, emphasizing the lasting impacts of trauma and the collective memory of ancestral sufferings.

Max Stossel (Award-winning Poet, Filmmaker, Speaker, Creator of Words That Move) uses the metaphor of a boxing ring to discuss the complexities of human conflict and connection, encouraging a shift from adversarial relationships to collaborative problem-solving.

To hear more from each guest, listen to their full interviews.

Episode Website

www.creativeprocess.info/pod

Instagram:@creativeprocesspodcast

What is the true meaning of the pursuit of happiness? What can we learn from the Founding Fathers about achieving harmony, balance, tranquility, self-mastery, and pursuing the public good?

Jeffrey Rosen is President and CEO of the National Constitution Center, where he hosts We the People, a weekly podcast of constitutional debate. He is also a professor of law at the George Washington University Law School and a contributing editor at The Atlantic. Rosen is a graduate of Harvard College, Oxford University, and Yale Law School. He is the author of seven previous books, including the New York Times bestseller Conversations with RBG: Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Life, Love, Liberty, and Law. His essays and commentaries have appeared in The New York Times Magazine; on NPR; in The New Republic, where he was the legal affairs editor; and in The New Yorker, where he has been a staff writer. His latest book is The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America.

"Being moved to write the sonnets was an unexpected gift that I was given. I certainly didn't expect that unusual practice, but I found myself moved to sum up the wisdom in concise and distilled form just by taking notes on the daily reading that I'd done each morning after watching the sunrise. And I was surprised to learn after starting the project that many people who read this wisdom during the Founding Era were also moved to write sonnets, including Phillis Wheatley, the great poet, Mercy Otis Warren, Alexander Hamilton, and John Quincy Adams, who would read the Tusculan Disputations in the original and read Cicero in the original in the White House for consolation, write sonnets, and watch the sunrise and walk along the Potomac."

https://constitutioncenter.org/about/board-of-trustees/jeffrey-rosen
www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Pursuit-of-Happiness/Jeffrey-Rosen/9781668002476
https://constitutioncenter.org/news-debate/podcasts

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“I want to quote a poem because it's not only a poem. It's a poem rethought by and revisited by a conceptual artist. It's called "All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving Grace". So this originally is a 1967 poem by an American author Richard Brautigan, but then in 2021, it became a video by Turkish artist Memo Akten. This video brings together an amazing array of images in which you see different natural environments and artificial intelligence. Gradually, they come to blend, and then they melt, and then they become one.”

I like to think
(it has to be!)
of a cybernetic ecology
where we are free of our labors
and joined back to nature,
returned to our mammal
brothers and sisters,
and all watched over
by machines of loving grace.

–Richard Brautigan

Paola Spinozzi is Professor of English Literature at the University of Ferrara and currently serves as Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Internationalisation. She is the coordinator of the PhD Programme in Environmental Sustainability and Wellbeing and the co-coordinator of Routes towards Sustainability. Her research encompasses the ecological humanities and ecocriticism, utopia and sustainability; literature and the visual arts; literature and science; cultural memory. She has co-edited Cultures of Sustainability and Wellbeing: Theories, Histories and Policies and published on post/apocalyptic and climate fiction, nature poetry, eco-theatre; art and aesthetics, imperialism and evolutionism in utopia as a genre; the writing of science; interart creativity.

https://docente.unife.it/paola.spinozzi https://www.unife.it/studenti/dottorato/it/corsi/riforma/environmental-sustainability-and-wellbeing
https://www.routesnetwork.net
https://www.routledge.com/Cultures-of-Sustainability-and-Wellbeing-Theories-Histories-and-Policies/Spinozzi-Mazzanti/p/book/9780367271190.

www.creativeprocess.info
www.oneplanetpodcast.org
IG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

How can we create positive change? What does it mean to have an ecological mind? How can interdisciplinary collaborations help us move beyond educational silos and create sustainable futures?

Paola Spinozzi is Professor of English Literature at the University of Ferrara and currently serves as Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Internationalisation. She is the coordinator of the PhD Programme in Environmental Sustainability and Wellbeing and the co-coordinator of Routes towards Sustainability. Her research encompasses the ecological humanities and ecocriticism, utopia and sustainability; literature and the visual arts; literature and science; cultural memory. She has co-edited Cultures of Sustainability and Wellbeing: Theories, Histories and Policies and published on post/apocalyptic and climate fiction, nature poetry, eco-theatre; art and aesthetics, imperialism and evolutionism in utopia as a genre; the writing of science; interart creativity.

“I want to quote a poem because it's not only a poem. It's a poem rethought by and revisited by a conceptual artist. It's called "All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving Grace". So this originally is a 1967 poem by an American author Richard Brautigan, but then in 2021, it became a video by Turkish artist Memo Akten. This video brings together an amazing array of images in which you see different natural environments and artificial intelligence. Gradually, they come to blend, and then they melt, and then they become one.”

I like to think
(it has to be!)
of a cybernetic ecology
where we are free of our labors
and joined back to nature,
returned to our mammal
brothers and sisters,
and all watched over
by machines of loving grace.

–Richard Brautigan

https://docente.unife.it/paola.spinozzi https://www.unife.it/studenti/dottorato/it/corsi/riforma/environmental-sustainability-and-wellbeing
https://www.routesnetwork.net
https://www.routledge.com/Cultures-of-Sustainability-and-Wellbeing-Theories-Histories-and-Policies/Spinozzi-Mazzanti/p/book/9780367271190.

www.creativeprocess.info
www.oneplanetpodcast.org
IG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

“I had so many people around me when I was young– famous poets like Ary dos Santos, one of Portugal’s greatest poets of the 20th century. Sometimes he would be there talking with my mother, and I had this information that was getting in, but I wasn’t aware of it. And then in the early days, when I had just started playing, I was really into modern jazz, which was very instrumental, so I didn’t really pay attention to lyrics. It took me a while to get interested in Portuguese music, and in that mixture between jazz, Fado music and Portuguese popular music. For a while I was into the importance of a good poem. Now what moves me most of the time is that mixture of cultures— trying to do something that you cannot find in other countries. If you are into a lot of American jazz, for instance, you can play great music, but you are always playing music that started elsewhere, you know? And for a European like me, it’s challenging to try and find what makes you different in such a big market. What sound can you try to create that you wouldn’t hear in France or in Japan or in New York? So that's a very difficult challenge, actually, because you try to get really into your heart and your emotion. And I think Portugal has a lot of good emotions in its popular music that you don't find elsewhere. The music I make always has a kind of nostalgic ambience. It's not always sadness. It's a melancholic approach that is very hard to put into words– you just need to feel it.”

Bernardo Moreira is one of the most active Portuguese double bassists. He has performed as a guest soloist with Gulbenkian, Metropolitan de Lisboa, and Nacional do Porto orchestras, and gained prominence for his collaborations with international artists, including the legendary Benny Colson, Freddie Hubbard, Wayne Shorter, Art Farmer, and Kenny Wheeler. He is a regular collaborator with many jazz musicians in Portugal, participating in formations such as the Maria João/Mário Laginha quartet, the Mário Laginha trio, and singer Cristina Branco. In 2021, he released Enter Paredes, and in 2022, he led Cantina’s de Main and SUL.

www.clavenamao.org
https://open.spotify.com/artist/0Yse2njeXg2XDiQmmxhAc5

www.creativeprocess.info
www.oneplanetpodcast.org
IG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast
Music on this episode:

António Marinheiro, Bernardo Moreira Sextet, from the album Entre Paredes

PROMESSAS MIX V3 ULT from SUL
Courtesy of Bernardo Moreira

Bernardo Moreira is one of the most active Portuguese double bassists. He has performed as a guest soloist with Gulbenkian, Metropolitan de Lisboa, and Nacional do Porto orchestras, and gained prominence for his collaborations with international artists, including the legendary Benny Colson, Freddie Hubbard, Wayne Shorter, Art Farmer, and Kenny Wheeler. He is a regular collaborator with many jazz musicians in Portugal, participating in formations such as the Maria João/Mário Laginha quartet, the Mário Laginha trio, and singer Cristina Branco. In 2021, he released Enter Paredes, and in 2022, he led Cantina’s de Main and SUL.

“I had so many people around me when I was young– famous poets like Ary dos Santos, one of Portugal’s greatest poets of the 20th century. Sometimes he would be there talking with my mother, and I had this information that was getting in, but I wasn’t aware of it. And then in the early days, when I had just started playing, I was really into modern jazz, which was very instrumental, so I didn’t really pay attention to lyrics. It took me a while to get interested in Portuguese music, and in that mixture between jazz, Fado music and Portuguese popular music. For a while I was into the importance of a good poem. Now what moves me most of the time is that mixture of cultures— trying to do something that you cannot find in other countries. If you are into a lot of American jazz, for instance, you can play great music, but you are always playing music that started elsewhere, you know? And for a European like me, it’s challenging to try and find what makes you different in such a big market. What sound can you try to create that you wouldn’t hear in France or in Japan or in New York? So that's a very difficult challenge, actually, because you try to get really into your heart and your emotion. And I think Portugal has a lot of good emotions in its popular music that you don't find elsewhere. The music I make always has a kind of nostalgic ambience. It's not always sadness. It's a melancholic approach that is very hard to put into words– you just need to feel it.”

www.clavenamao.org
https://open.spotify.com/artist/0Yse2njeXg2XDiQmmxhAc5

www.creativeprocess.info
www.oneplanetpodcast.org
IG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast
Music on this episode:

António Marinheiro, Bernardo Moreira Sextet, from the album Entre Paredes

PROMESSAS MIX V3 ULT from SUL
Courtesy of Bernardo Moreira

“We become the stories we tell ourselves…I started writing around the time I learned English because we moved to the States soon after my fourth birthday, and so I was here for kindergarten into elementary school. I grasped this new language just as I was learning how to also put things onto the page. Those two things really happened at the same time for me. I entered this world where I felt very different and very other, for all intents and purposes I was set to be raised in Kuwait. And then that of course got turned upside down after the invasion by Saddam. I think that so much of my trying to make sense of the world had to do with the displacement, exile and these experiences that my parents had experienced but then that I had as well as we were fleeing the war. It’s hard to know because I think that language was being formed in my brain at the same time that these things were happening.”

Hala Alyan is the author of the novel Salt Houses, winner of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and the Arab American Book Award and a finalist for the Chautauqua Prize, as well as the forthcoming novel The Arsonists’ City, and four award-winning collections of poetry, most recently The Twenty-Ninth Year. Her work has been published by the New Yorker, the Academy of American Poets, Lit Hub, The New York Times Book Review, and Guernica. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband, where she works as a clinical psychologist.

· halaalyan.com
· www.creativeprocess.info

Hala Alyan is the author of the novel Salt Houses, winner of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and the Arab American Book Award and a finalist for the Chautauqua Prize, as well as the forthcoming novel The Arsonists’ City, and four award-winning collections of poetry, most recently The Twenty-Ninth Year. Her work has been published by the New Yorker, the Academy of American Poets, Lit Hub, The New York Times Book Review, and Guernica. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband, where she works as a clinical psychologist.

· halaalyan.com
· www.creativeprocess.info

Poets, novelists, activists & translators discuss the Art of Writing and The Creative Process. This episode features:

NEIL GAIMAN - Writer, Producer, Showrunner - The Sandman, American Gods, Good Omens, Coraline

JERICHO BROWN - Pulitzer Prize-winning Poet: The Tradition
Editor of How We Do It: Black Writers on Craft, Practice, and Skill

ADA LIMÓN, U.S. Poet Laureate - The Hurting Kind, The Carrying

MARGE PIERCY - Award-winning Novelist, Poet & Activist

E.J. KOH - Award-Winning Memoirist & Poet - The Magical Language of Others, A Lesser Love

MAX STOSSEL - Award-winning Poet, Filmmaker, Speaker
Creator of Words That Move

www.creativeprocess.info
www.oneplanetpodcast.org
IG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast