January 05, 2005

Guy Davenport Dead

First Sontag, then 100,000+ lives from the tsunami, then Will Eisner, now Guy Davenport. This is a pretty shitty week. Wood S Lot has plentiful Davenport links.

Posted by DrMabuse at January 5, 2005 03:29 PM
Comments

I was a grad student at the U. of Kentucky and took Guy Davenport's course in 20th century English Verse in Fall semester 1983. We had two assignments: One, a term paper, which was to answer the question: "What is English about English poetry?", and Two, weekly submissions of our reactions to our assigned readings from "The Oxford Book of Twentieth Century English Verse." The submissions had to be hand written on 5 x 8 index cards. Nothing else would do. If a student submitted a note, however interesting, on a 3 x 5 card, or a folded sheet of typing paper, G.D. would hold it up to the class, and rip it in half.
I later transferred to another school for continuing graduate studies. I maintained correspondence with G.D., and he answered every letter, either by hand or by typewriter. God bless him.

Paul Baker
Madison, Wis.

Posted by: paul baker at January 9, 2005 04:30 PM