Thomas Lux

Talking to students at the Dodge Festival in 2000, THOMAS LUX described his life as a poet as “like any other job.  You pack your lunch pail and you go to work.”  This very down-to-earth approach reveals something essential about Lux: he understands that the work itself is too challenging, and too important, to be romanticized.  This does not mean the creative act is lacking mystery for him.  No one knows where inspiration comes from, but for Lux, to therefore imagine all artists have to do is wait passively for it to arrive is to trivialize the real work of art. His collections of poetry include God Particles: Poems (2008); The Cradle Place (2004); The Street of Clocks (2001); New and Selected Poems, 1975-1995 (1997), which was a finalist for the 1998 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize; The Blind Swimmer: Selected Early Poems, 1970-1975 (1996); and Split Horizon (1994), for which he received the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award.

Visit his page on the Poetry Foundation website here. 

Click here to read our blog about Thomas Lux.

Schedule

THURSDAY

11:00-12:15
Conversation: The Riches of Daily Life
Sharon Dolin, Thomas Lux, Idra Novey
First Peddie Baptist Memorial Church

2:00-3:15pm
Reading and Conversation
Ada Limón, Thomas Lux, Idra Novey
Prudential Hall

7:30-10:00
POETRY SAMPLER
Richard Blanco, Eavan Boland, Henri Cole, Sharon Dolin, Nikky Finney, Terrance Hayes, Juan Felipe Herrera, Jane Hirshfield, Fanny Howe, Kurtis Lamkin, Dorianne Laux, Ada Limón, Thomas Lux, Rachel McKibbens, Taylor Mali, Joseph Millar, Idra Novey, Gregory Orr, Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Patricia Smith, Arthur Sze, Larissa Szporluk, Natasha Trethewey, C.K. Williams, Raúl Zurita
Prudential Hall
 

FRIDAY

10:50-11:50am
Poets on Poetry
Thomas Lux
Trinity & St. Philip’s Cathedral

12:10-1:10pm
Festival Poet Readings
Thomas Lux, Larissa Szporluk, C. K. Williams, Raúl Zurita, Paul Legault
Victoria Theatre

6:30-10:00pm
Readings & Music
Terrance Hayes, Thomas Lux, Fanny Howe, Jane Hirshfield, Kurtis Lamkin
Prudential Hall
 

SATURDAY

9:00-10:10am
Festival Poets Reading
Dan Bellm, Cynthia Arrieu-King, Thomas Lux
Trinity & St. Philip’s Cathedral

10:30-11:40
Conversation: Tell All the Truth, But Tell it Slant
Ada Limón, Thomas Lux, Idra Novey, Arthur Sze
North Star Academy Gym
 

SUNDAY

9:00-10:10am
Festival Poet Readings
Richard Blanco, Dorianne Laux, Timothy Liu, Thomas Lux
North Star Academy Gym

10:30-11:40
Conversation: Going Public with Private Feelings
Nicky Beer, Thomas Lux, Idra Novey, Gregory Orr
North Star Academy Gym