Funds for Bookworm are provided in part by Lannin Foundation.

You are a human animal.

You are a very special breed,

or you are the only animal,

who can think, who can reason, who can read.

From KCRW, Santa Monica, I'm Michael Silverblatt, and this is Bookworm. Today I'm very honored

to have as my guest, Leonard Cohn, who has a new book of poetry, the Book of Longing,

being published by Harper Collins.

I'm very thrilled to be talking to Leonard because when I arrived in college

1969, the book, his novel, Beautiful Losers, had come out in paperback.

It was required reading in many classes, and when you walked between the English department

and the dormitory, you could hear the first or the second record being played on stereo

speakers out the windows.

I believe his work created part of the context of a very happy time. I, of course,

have been listening to the records and reading the subsequent books of poetry, and this is the

first time we've spoken together. The book seems in particular, Book of Longing, to bring the reader close to what a poet's

notebook looks like.

I think that's good.

That it's an authentic expression of what it is to lead a private life, to be drawing pictures,

to be doodling, writing the beginnings of poems, seeing where they lead.

I think that's a, I myself, having undergone some kind of disintegration of the mind, have lost my capacity

to concentrate for very long periods of time. So I enjoy notebooks and footnotes. I find myself

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