Mary Gilliand Delivers Introduction to Poet Gary Snyder at Cornell University

[Left to right Gary Snyder, Christopher Dunn, Mary Gilliand, and Gen Snyder]

To kick off their 2016 Fall Lecture Series at Cornell University's Cornell Plantations, Pulitzer-prize winning Gary Snyder delivered the lecture "Scholars, Hermits and People of the Land" to a full house on August 24th in Call Auditorium, Kennedy Hall. (see video below).

Mary Gilliand, a long time member of the Dzogchen Community delivered the lively and moving introduction to Gary Snyder following Christopher Dunn's introduction. Now in his 86th year, Gary Snyder is an iconic poet at the forefront of ecology and poetics.

In an essay published in A Controversy of Poets, Snyder offered his own assessment of his art. “As a poet,” he wrote, “I hold the most archaic values on earth. They go back to the late Paleolithic: the fertility of the soil, the magic of animals, the power-vision in solitude, the terrifying initiation and rebirth; the love and ecstasy of the dance, the common work of the tribe. I try to hold both history and wilderness in mind, that my poems may approach the true measure of things and stand against the unbalance and ignorance of our times.”

--Reprinted from the Poetry Foundation page on Snyder

Listen now.......

Gary Snyder at Cornell Plantations from Cornell Plantations on Vimeo.