I am very pleased to announce, that as of this afternoon, former Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress Daniel Hoffman will be our Poem of the Decade judge. As of this past April, the InterBoard Poetry Community has been around ten years. And as of this summer, when our 2009-10 Poem of the Year judge, Dana Goodyear, e-mailed to me her results, we had ten years of those results. Dan will be reading the top two poems of each of year, which comes to 20 poems, as there were no ties.

Dan has already been active in IBPC. He introduced us to Kelly Cherry, our 2007-08 Poem of the Year judge. He has also suggested other superb poetry people, who are on the invitation list. It was Frank Wilson, our October 2005 judge, who introduced us to Dan. In 2006, Frank wrote, "I think Dan is the greatest living American poet." Here is a link to a blog in which Patrick Kurp discusses this statement: Audacious.

Here are some interviews with Daniel Hoffman:

Books Inq.--The Epilogue: An Interview with Daniel Hoffman (video)

Per Contra: A Poet Who Brought Poetry to the Millions, Daniel Hoffman speaks about Elizabeth McFarland

The Mad Poets Blog: An Interview with Daniel Hoffman by J.F. Pirro

New York Sun: The Poet of Cape Rosier

That second interview link is Dan speaking of his wife Elizabeth McFarland, who was the poetry editor for Ladies' Home Journal, and a poet herself. So he adds to the list of IBPC judges, those who have been married to poets. Indeed we have had two married couples judge for us, Hélène Cardona and John FitzGerald in fall 2008, and Dorianne Laux and Joseph Millar in winter 2010. He also has done an essay on a collection of Hungarian poetry edited by George Szirtes, our judge for summer 2009. In these ways, he is already part of us.

Here are some articles and talks by Daniel Hoffman:

Hungarian Quarterly: Poetry Not Lost in Translation

Poetry Society of America: Elizabeth McFarland: A Poet Who Brought Poetry to the Millions (pdf)

Mickle Street: 'Hankering, Gross, Mystical, Nude': Whitman''s 'Self' and the American Tradition (pdf)

YouTube: Professor Hoffman reads and discusses "The Raven" (video)

For a good synopsis of his professional accomplishments, here is the citation from 2005, when he received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Swarthmore College:

Commencement 2005: Daniel Hoffman: Honorary Degree Citation

Daniel Hoffman has written eleven collections of poetry, a memoir, and seven volumes criticism. Here are his available books online, with partial previews available:

Google Books: inauthor:"Daniel Hoffman"

And here are some of his online poems:

Arriving at last

At the Lookout

The Center of Attention

Darts, 1965

A Democratic Vista

Identities

Old Age

Plums

Saturday

Speech

Today

A Wilding



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