William Carlos Williams: 11 Essential Poems

Published: Dec. 15, 2022, 5 a.m.

An episode from 12/15/22: Tonight, I read eleven essential poems from the American poet William Carlos Williams (1883-1963). In the same generation as T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound, Williams is perhaps best known for never becoming an expatriate, and instead living most of his life as a family doctor in Rutherford, New Jersey.

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His poems can be found in The Collected Poems Volume I: 1909-1939, The Collected Poems Volume II: 1939-1962, and Paterson.\xa0The biographies I read from are Paul Mariani\u2019s William Carlos Williams: A New World Naked, and the essay on Williams\u2019 life at The Poetry Foundation.

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The poems I read are:

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  • Pastoral (1917)
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  • Danse Russe (1917)
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  • Waiting (1921)
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  • The Great Figure (1921)
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  • The Red Wheelbarrow (1923)
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  • Flowers by the Sea (first version) (1931)
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  • War, the Destroyer! (1942)
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  • Approach to a City (1946)
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  • To a Dog Injured in the Street (1954)
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  • Deep Religious Faith (1954)
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  • from Asphodel, That Greeny Flower (1955)
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Any comments, or suggestions for readings I should make in later episodes, can be emailed to humanvoiceswakeus1@gmail.com.

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