Inaugural poet

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As Inaugural Poet one is a poet called that at the inauguration ( s .: inauguration) of the President of the United States maintains a penned especially for this celebration poem. Most of the time, the exclusive selection of the writer is made at the special request of the president to be sworn in . It is considered a high immaterial honor. So far there have only been five inaugural poets. As a rule, the poems you recite are strongly patriotic, depending on the occasion.

List of poets

number portrait Surname date president
1   Robert Frost January 20, 1961 John F. Kennedy
Frost in 1961 The four-time Pulitzer Prize winner and US American "national poet" Frost (1874–1963) was the first to have the honor of performing his poetry at the inauguration of a president. He had originally planned to read the specially written poem Dedication as a preamble to the verse The Gift Outright, desired by Kennedy and written as early as 1936 . The blinding sun on the fresh snow around the Capitol, the strong wind, which made his manuscript flutter with its pale font, caused him to recite his old work instead, freely and spontaneously from memory. It was first presented by him on December 5, 1941 at the College of William & Mary and was published in the spring of 1942 in the literary journal Virginia Quarterly Review .
2   Maya Angelou January 20, 1993 Bill Clinton
Maya Angelou speaking at the inauguration of Bill Clinton in 1993 33 years after Frost, the writer, professor and human rights activist of the American African American civil rights movement read her poem On the Pulse of Morning , which thematically revolved around the key issues of change, inclusion, responsibility and the role of both president and president of the population to create economic security. It was viewed by many critics as an autobiographical poem and received mostly negative reviews. At the same time, for example, Mary Jane Lupton also stated that Angelous (1928-2014) theatrical presentation - she resorted to her speaker and actor training - was a return to the American-African tradition of oral tradition. The following year, 1994 , Angelou received the Grammy Award for the recorded audio version of the poem in the category “Best Spoken Word Or Non-musical Album”.
3   Miller Williams January 20, 1997 Bill Clinton
The nationally relatively unknown poet, translator and editor Miller Williams (1930-2015), who, like the president, comes from Arkansas , was selected as the poet for Clinton's second inauguration . He taught at various universities as a lecturer first in biology and later in English literature and founded the University of Arkansas Press in 1980 , which he then headed for 20 years. His poem was entitled Of History and Hope and placed a special focus on the responsibility of the contemporary generation for the children to whom the land is left. As part of the celebrations, Clinton also recognized him for his lifelong contributions to the arts with the National Arts Award .
4th   Elizabeth Alexander January 20, 2009 Barack Obama
Elizabeth Alexander in May 2015 The naming of Elizabeth Alexander (* 1962) was received with praise and very benevolent both by various writers and by the Chicago- based Poetry Foundation . The poet, essayist and screenwriter is good friends with Barack Obama and currently teaches (as of January 2013) English, English and African-American literature and gender studies at Yale University . Her poem Praise Song for the Day , written for the inauguration, was received with moderate applause from the audience while it was being recited. The subsequent reviews were also very negative and criticized, among other things, that the text was too prosaic and Alexander's lecture was insufficiently dramatic. The Star Tribune even judged the poem to be "boring and bureaucratic". It has been proven that Alexander's place is not on a platform, but in the crowd. She should not speak for the people, but to them.
5   Richard Blanco January 21, 2013 Barack Obama
Richard Blanco speaking at Barack Obama's inauguration in 2013 The election of Blancos (* 1968) attracted a lot of media attention in the run-up to the inauguration and brought the role of inaugural poet to public awareness and interest. The native Spaniard, son of Cubans in exile , is not only the youngest poet ever chosen for the occasion, but also the first Hispanic and the first to be openly homosexual . His election was therefore widely understood as an illustration of Obama's tolerance and cosmopolitanism. Blanco read the poem One Today .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Bob Holman, Margery Snyder: Presidential Inauguration Poems , at poetry.about.com . Retrieved January 26, 2013
  2. ↑ Carol Rumens: Elizabeth Alexander's praise poem was way too prosy , January 21, 2009 on guardian.co.uk ( The Guardian ). Retrieved January 26, 2013
  3. ↑ Sheryl Gay Stolberg: Poet's Kinship With the President , January 8, 2013 on nytimes.com ( The New York Times ). Retrieved January 26, 2013

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