John Gardner (Magill’s Literary Annual 2005)
At a glance:
- Author: Barry Silesky
- First Published: 2004
- Type of Work: Literary biography
- Time of Work: 1933-1982
- Setting: Batavia, New York; Chico, California; San Francisco; Carbondale, Illinois; and Bennington, Vermont
- Genres: Nonfiction, Biography
- Subjects: Teaching or teachers, New York, United States or Americans, Twentieth century, Authors or writers, Literature, Accidents, Fame
- Locales: San Francisco, CA, Illinois, Bennington, VT, Batavia, NY
In 1973, Barry Silesky quit a teaching job he disliked and prepared to apply to law school. Stopping to read John Gardner's recently published Sunlight Dialogues, he came across a passage that permanently changed his life. The passage read in part, “Poets made poems that might …endure a thousand years. But what was it a lawyer made …?” Silesky set aside his law school application after concluding that nothing “could be more worthwhile than the work Gardner was doing,” and embarked upon his own writing career. By 2004, Silesky's published works included two literary...
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