Muriel Rukeyser

PoemTalk Podcast #78, discussing Muriel Rukeyser's "Ballad of Orange and Grape," March 19, 2014

Listen to the complete recording and read program notes for the episode at Jacket2.



Reading Letter to the Front: Sections 1, 3, and 10, 1944

Special thanks to the Woodberry Poetry Room, Harvard University for providing this recording. Poems and commentary by Muriel Rukeyser, March 21, 1959 from the Lee Anderson Papers, Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Library, Yale University

Believe that we bloom upon this stalk of time (2:27): MP3 [preceded by Lee Anderson's general introduction] Ajanta (11:43): MP3 [begins with part 1, "The Journey"] The Return (2:02): MP3 Divining Water (2:54): MP3 After Their Quarrel (2:22): MP3 ["very much a poem of adolescence"] The Young Girl of the Mississippi Valley (1:53): MP3 A Birth (2:27): MP3 Q&A Discussion, part 1 [hosted by Lee Anderson] (31:12): MP3 Q&A Discussion, part 2 [hosted by Anderson] (2:54): MP3

on prosody (7:52): MP3

on the San Francisco Poets (1:40): MP3

on the relationship between linguistics and poetry (2:03): MP3

on contemporary prosodists (2:16): MP3

on the role of the poet (3:55): MP3

on the relationship between the poet and the mathematician (4:36): MP3

on how other art forms feed into her poetry (0:47): MP3

on the Pacific Coast and New York poetry scenes (7:59): MP3

on the difficulty of the Beats' attitude toward women (2:51): MP3 Suite for Lord Timothy Dexter (23:50): MP3 [about "an American eccentric" who showed "that the business proverbs were way off"] Are You Born? (3:40): MP3 [in two parts; about 2-year-old children at the Vassar Family Institute; this work is "the framework for a large group of poems"] Body of Waking (18:23): MP3 Speed, We Say (2:01): MP3 [a poem that starts with a jet plane across the sky and ends with a love poem; it is "bound by the image of speed"] The Birth of Venus (2:14): MP3 ["the myth...as we scarcely ever hear it in school"] Murmurs from the earth of this land (2:33): MP3 [this poem is from a group of poems enclosed with a series called "Are You Born?"] The Sixth Night: Waking (1:10): MP3 [referring to the 6th night of creation, the moment of man and woman] In your time, there have been those who spoke clearly (4:00): MP3 [also a poem enclosed with the "Are You Born?" series in One Life]

Complete recording, Reel 1 (29:10): MP3

Complete recording, Reel 2 (31:31): MP3

Complete recording, Reel 3 (30:28): MP3

Complete recording, Reel 4 (30:53): MP3

Special thanks to Nancy Kuhl, William Rukeyser, and the estate of Muriel Rukeyser for making these recordings available.

Reading in the Recording Laboratory at the Library of Congress, April 17, 1962

Complete recording (56:10); MP3

Introduction (0:37): MP3 Water Lily Fire (17:45): MP3 Song (A Voice Flew Out) (0:36): MP3 To Enter That Rhythm Where the Self Is Lost (1:29): MP3 The Speaking Tree (1:32): MP3 The Way Out (5:28): MP3 Boy with His Hair Cut Short (3:04): MP3 Are You Born (3:12): MP3 Murmurs from the Earth of This Land (2:12): MP3 No One Ever Walking This Our Only Earth (2:21): MP3 Haying Before Storm (1:39): MP3 A Birth (2:33): MP3 Night Feeding (2:00): MP3 Discussion (9:00): MP3

Reading in the Whittall Pavillion at the Library of Congress, April 5, 1965

Complete recording (1:12:07); MP3

Introduction (3:00): MP3 Song (0:42): MP3 Eyes of Nighttime (2:00): MP3 Reading Time (1 Minute 26 Seconds) (6:34): MP3 Darkness Music (0:29): MP3 Haying Before Storm (1:59): MP3 Easter Eve (4:27): MP3 Are You Born (2:55): MP3 Song (2) (0:36): MP3 Ajanta (15:34): MP3 The Seeming (2:46): MP3 The Orgy (2:47): MP3 The Poem as Mask (2:45): MP3 The Power of Suicide (0:26): MP3 Double Dialogue (2:11): MP3 The Transgress (1:08): MP3 The Outer Banks (13:32): MP3 The Wreck of the Tiger (1:47): MP3

Reading at the University of Warwick, 1971

Courtesy of University of Warwick.

Complete Recording (44:47): MP3

The Ballad of Orange and Grape (6:02): MP3

"The Ballad of Orange and Grape" is also featured on PoemTalk Episode 78.

Reading 29 poems at the University of Warwick, January 19, 1972

Courtesy of University of Warwick.

Complete Recording (41:59): MP3

Murial Rukeyser reads at Dowling College, introduced by Aaron Kramer, October 11, 1976

Full (1:15:55): MP3

Better Quality, nearly full (1:06:07): MP3

Incomplete (14:06): MP3

The Caedmon Poetry Collection: A Century of Poets Reading Their Work

The Poetry and Voice of Muriel Rukeyser, 1977

The Poem as Mask: Orpheus (1:23): MP3 Night Feeder (1:45): MP3 Are You Born? (2:35): MP3 No One Ever Walking This Our Only Earth (2:26): MP3 Song (0:32): MP3 The Dam (7:54): MP3 Waterlily Fire: Fragile (0:34): MP3 Waterlily Fire: The Long Body (3:08): MP3 In Our Time (0:19): MP3 Poem (1:45): MP3 The Ballad of Orange and Grape (2:46): MP3 Speed of Darkness (2:52): MP3 This Morning (1:28): MP3 Despisals (1:33): MP3 Looking At Each Other (1:41): MP3 To Be a Jew in the Twentieth Century (1:08): MP3 Columbus (4:10): MP3 Burning the Dreams (0:51): MP3 St. Roach (1:52): MP3 Dream Drumming (1:15): MP3 Rune (0:48): MP3 How We Did It (1:43): MP3 Then (0:30): MP3 Mother as Pitchfork (1:11): MP3 Poems for the Unborn Child (2:22): MP3

Complete Recording (50:07): MP3

"The Ballad of Orange and Grape" is also featured on PoemTalk Episode 78.

The Writer In America: Muriel Rukeyser, a film by Richard O. Moore, Westbeth, New York City, October 1977

Complete video recording (28:55)

Reading at the University of Warwick, September 8, 1978

Courtesy of University of Warwick.

Complete Recording (46:32): MP3

Reading from a group of poems about Akiba, date unknown

"The Way Out" (5:50): MP3

Recording courtesy of Poetry Foundation

Unknown Reading

Complete reading (33:18): MP3

(c) Muriel Rukeyser. Recordings available for non-commercial and educational use only. Distributed with permission by PennSound (writing.upenn.edu/pennsound).

These sound recordings are being made available for noncommercial and educational use only. All rights to this recorded material belong to the author. © 2014 Muriel Rukeyser. Used with permission of the estate of Muriel Rukeyser. Distributed by PennSound.