About this item
"Lyrical, affectionate . . . Graceful reflections on creativity." -- Kirkus Reviews The Education of a Young Poet is David Biespiel's moving account of his awakening to writing and the language that can shape a life. Exploring the original source of his creative impulse -- a great-grandfather who traveled alone from Ukraine to America in 1910, eventually settling as a rag peddler in the tiny town of Elma, Iowa -- through the generations that followed, Biespiel tracks his childhood in Texas and his university days in the northeast, led along by the "pattern and random bursts that make up a life." His book offers an intimate recollection of how one person forges a life as a writer during extraordinary times. From the Jewish quarter of Houston in the 1970s to bohemian Boston in the 1980s, from Russia's Pale of Settlement to a farming village in Vermont, Biespiel remains alert to the magic of possibilities -- ancestral journeys, hash parties, political rallies, family connections, uncertain loves, the thrill of sex, and lasting friendships.
About the Author
was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1964, raised in Texas, and educated at Stanford University, University of Maryland, and Boston University.
