On Marianne Moore and Grace Schulman

John McIntyre at Poetry Magazine:

If you place their bodies of work end to end chronologically, Marianne Moore and Grace Schulman together created more than a century’s worth of American poetry. Moore’s first published poems appeared in Poetry in 1915; the 84-year-old Schulman’s most recent collection is Without a Claim (2013), although she’s published poems and a memoir since, and this year edited Mourning Songs, a compilation of poems about death and grief. Both women were poetry editors at major magazines, Moore during the latter years of Dial and Schulman at the Nation from 1971 to 2006. That tenure overlapped with a dozen years—1973 to 1985—during which Schulman helmed the Poetry Center at the 92nd Street Y. She has also taught at Baruch College for decades, extending her knowledge and influence, and perhaps a bit of Moore’s influence by proxy, to generations of young poets.

Schulman has been candid about her connection to Moore, whom she met in 1949. Schulman was 14 at the time. “They said she was a great poet,” Schulman writes in her memoir, Strange Paradise: Portrait of a Marriage (2018). “I was struck by the combination of her humility and gorgeous vocabulary. I liked her humor, ranging from deadpan to high comedy.”

more here.