Wesley Wehr
Author of The Eighth Lively Art: Conversations with Painters, Poets, Musicians, and the Wicked Witch of the West.
EVENT: Wehr reads at Elliott Bay Book Company on Mon Dec 11 at 7:30 pm.
Do you feel that the time you chronicled in the book was a time of singular artistic vitality? “I’d have to say that since the 1950s and ’60s, there have been ongoing times of great vitality in the Northwest arts. The time about which I write in The Eighth Lively Art was historically crucial, and it is not well recorded.”
You began taking notes of conversations at 19. What inspired you to record your conversations like that? “I began to take notes because I realized that a time would come when I would be glad I had.”
Was there anyone you wish you had gotten to meet that you didn’t? “I had an opportunity to meet the sculptor Brancusi when I was in Paris in 1956 and I didn’t. However, I did correspond with Herman Hesse during the 1960s.”
Was there anyone that seemed particularly ahead of their time? “As a philosopher, Susanne Langer certainly was. Mark Tobey is one of the groundbreaking painters of his time. Elizabeth Bishop’s importance as a poet is being recognized more and more since her death. Each of the people I wrote about was a remarkable person.”
What do you think of the present-day Northwest arts scene? “Just now, it’s the young writers that I feel are doing great writing here. I especially admire and enjoy Rebecca Brown. Everything she writes is superb. I can’t praise her enough. Gregory Martin’s Mountain City is a really lovely book. Karen Cushman’s books are supposed to be for children but I can’t imagine there being anyone, young or old, who wouldn’t be moved by them. And Greg Nagan’s 5-Minute Iliad is the deftest humor I’ve come upon in years. These are books I would take with me to the sea, to the desert, or to a tropical island.”
Are there any current artists that you would like to see get wider recognition? “As Mark Tobey told me, ‘I wouldn’t wish fame on my worst enemy.'”