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HOST:
Welcome to AMERICAN MOSAIC — a VOA Special English program aboutmusic and American life. And we answer your questions.
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This is Doug Johnson. This week – we answer a listener who wantsto know why a woman has never been elected president. And weremember the music of Johnny Cash. But first – meet America’s newpoet laureate.
New Poet Laureate
HOST:
Next month America will get a new national poet. The next poetlaureate is Louise Elisabeth Gluck (pronounced glick). She has wonthe Pulitzer Prize and many other honors. Bob Doughty tells more.
ANNCR:
Louise Gluck is the twelfth person to be named Poet LaureateConsultant in Poetry. Mizz Gluck is the third woman to serve in thatposition. It was created in nineteen-eighty-six. Before that theposition had a different name.
James Billington is the Librarian of Congress. He announced theappointment of Louise Gluck. Mister Billington says she will bring astrong, deep poetic voice to her work as poet laureate. The outgoingpoet laureate is Billy Collins. Mister Collins served two terms.Each term is one year.
Louise Gluck will receivethirty-five-thousand-dollars as poet laureate. She is to organize apoetry reading by others. She will also take part in programs nextFebruary and May. Mizz Gluck says she wants to recognize excellentworks by young poets. She was also appointed this year to judge theYale Series of Younger Poets.
Louise Gluck started to write poetry as a young child. She wasborn in nineteen-forty-three in New York. There she attended SarahLawrence College and Columbia University. But she did not stay verylong in either school. For the past twenty years she has taught atWilliams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts. She teachesEnglish, poetry writing and modern poetry. She will continue toteach during her term as poet laureate.
Mizz Gluck has written nine books of poetry. They include “TheSeven Ages,” “Vita Nova” and “Ararat.” Her poem “The Wild Iris” wonthe Pulitzer Prize in nineteen-ninety-three. Here are the openinglines of “The Wild Iris” by Louise Gluck, read by Sarah Long.
VOICE:
“At the end of my suffering
There was a door.
Hear me out: that which you call death
I remember.
Overhead, noises, branches of the pine shifting.
Then nothing. The weak sun
Flickered over the dry surface.
It is terrible to survive
As consciousness
Buried in the dark earth.”
Female President
HOST:
Our VOA listener question this week is from Ethiopia. TheodrosSolomon in Arsi asks why the United States has never had a femalepresident.
The Constitution says anyone born in America can becomepresident. Several women have tried. In eighteen-seventy-two andeighteen-ninety-two, Victoria Woodhull was a candidate of the EqualRights Party. Over the years other women presidential candidateshave included, among the most recent, Leonora Fulani of the AmericanNew Alliance Party. But these women were all nominated by smallparties and really had no chance to win.
Just this week, Carol MoseleyBraun officially launched her campaign for the Democratic Partynomination for president in next year’s election. Innineteen-ninety-two she made history as the first black womanelected to the Senate. Now she is the only woman among tenDemocratic candidates.
Historians say a woman did act as president for a short time, innineteen-nineteen. Edith Galt Wilson was the wife of PresidentWoodrow Wilson. He was very sick for about six months. During thattime, Missus Wilson controlled who saw her husband and when. Sheread all his documents and decided which would go to the presidentto consider. She later wrote that her husband’s doctor thought thiswould be a way to help him regain his health. President Wilson leftoffice when his term ended in nineteen-twenty-one.
Today, experts say it is not a question if Americans will elect awoman president, but when. Some expect the Democratic Party tonominate New York Senator Hillary Clinton within the next ten years.And North Carolina Senator Elizabeth Dole is named as a possiblepresidential candidate of the Republican Party.
Johnny Cash
(MUSIC – “Cry, Cry, Cry”)
HOST:
The music of Johnny Cash lives on in the more than fifty-millionrecords he sold during his lifetime. Johnny Cash died earlier thismonth at the age of seventy-one. He had suffered for years from theeffects of diabetes. Faith Lapidus remembers his life and his music.
ANNCR:
Johnny Cash was born in Arkansas, in the South, innineteen-thirty-two. His father was a cotton farmer. As a boy,Johnny Cash helped on the farm. He also sang on local radio. Afterhigh school he joined the Air Force. He was sent to Germany, wherehe began to write songs, including one of his greatest hits, “FolsomPrison Blues.”
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Johnny Cash signed with a record company after he left the AirForce. Here is “I Walk the Line,” his nineteen-fifty-six releasewhich sold two-million copies.
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Johnny Cash often sang about his inner struggles. His music couldbe as dark as the clothes that earned him the name “the man inblack.” For years he had problems with alcohol and drugs. A lot ofpeople thought he had been in prison. But he only spent one night injail.
In all, Johnny Cash recorded more then one-thousand-five-hundredsongs — and not just country music. He also sang religious songs,rock-and-roll and blues. He won eleven Grammy awards. And he ishonored in both the Country Music Hall of Fame and the Rock and RollHall of Fame. Elvis Presley is the only other singer with thathonor.
Johnny Cash continued to record until the very end of his life.Last month, he received an MTV Music Award for his performance in acurrent video. In it, he sings a song by the rock group Nine InchNails. We leave you now with Johnny Cash singing “Hurt.”
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HOST:
This is Doug Johnson.
Our program was written by Nancy Steinbach and Jerilyn Watson.Our producer was Caty Weaver.
I hope you enjoyed our program. Join us again next week forAMERICAN MOSAIC — VOA’s radio magazine in Special English.