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April 15, 2004
Franz and James Wright
NY Times has a great article on Franz Wright, one of my favorite poets, who won the Pulitzer Prize recently. His father, James Wright, also won it about 30 years ago, also for poetry. Franz grew up almost entirely without his father around, but their lives have followed very similar paths involving a lot of drug and alcohol abuse, and general misery and self-destruction.
James Wright's life as a poet involved a lot of famous people: Theodore Roethke, Anne Sexton, John Berryman. Says Franz about his childhood with his father and his friends: "I thought that all adults were insane drunks and chain smokers." That's poets for you.
