Wendell Berry's Sabbath Poem III (1994)

The Daily Poem

Goldberry Studios

Education For Kids, Arts, Kids & Family

4.6 • 729 Ratings

🗓️ 9 March 2021

⏱️ 9 minutes

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Summary

Wendell Erdman Berry (born August 5, 1934) is an American novelist, poet, essayist, environmental activist, cultural critic, and farmer.[1] He is an elected member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers, a recipient of The National Humanities Medal, and the Jefferson Lecturer for 2012. He is also a 2013 Fellow of The American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Berry was named the recipient of the 2013 Richard C. Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award.[2] On January 28, 2015, he became the first living writer to be inducted into the Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame.[3] - Bio via Wikipedia.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome back to the Daily Poem. I'm David Kern, and today is Tuesday, March 9th, 2021.
0:06.0	Today's poem is by Wendell Berry. He's been on this podcast, a time or two. You know,
0:11.2	a long-time listener, you know we love him. He was born in August of 1934 and is, of course,
0:16.3	a novelist, an essayist, an environmental activist, a cultural critic, and a farmer in addition to being
0:21.7	a poet. He's highly awarded and highly thought of one of the most beloved among the living American poets.
0:28.8	And today's poem is a poem that was published in 1994. It's one of his Sabbath poems, and it's just
0:34.2	labeled number three. It begins with the epigram. He must be born again.
0:38.9	That's in parentheses for those of you who just want to kind of imagine what it looks like.
0:43.1	The poem is based on King Lear, and this is how it goes.
0:46.6	I'll read it, and then I'm going to share some of Barry's own thoughts on that play,
0:50.1	and then some of my thoughts on the poem, and then read it one more time.
0:55.5	I think of Gluster, blind,
0:58.6	led through the world to the world's edge
1:01.2	by the hand of a stranger who is his faithful son.
1:06.2	At the cliff's verge, he flings away his life as of no worth,
1:15.3	the true way lost, his eyes, two bleeding wounds, and finds his life again, and is led on by the forsaken son who has become his father,
1:22.4	that the good may recognize each other, and at last go ripe to death.
1:28.0	We live the given life and not the planned.
1:34.5	So this is a poem inspired by Shakespeare's tragedy, King Lear.
1:38.5	In that play, there's a character named Gluster,
1:41.4	who is captured by his enemies because of the treacherousness of his
1:47.3	illegitimate son, Edmund, and his eyes are put out, he's blinded, and then he's cast out
	...

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