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https://slate.com/culture/2022/10/rod-mckuen-best-selling-poet-songs-what-happened.html>
"On April 29, 1969, Carnegie Hall was sold out. The artist who filled the
fabled performance hall wasn’t a symphony orchestra, or a Broadway belter, or a
jazz star. It wasn’t a rock band or a folk singer or any hero of the
counterculture taking the stage just a few months before Woodstock. On that
night, more than 3,000 fans filled the Main Hall on 57th Street to see a placid
blond man wearing a sweatshirt and sneakers. He stood before a microphone on
his 36th birthday and performed a poem about a lost cat named Sloopy.
But once upon a time
In New York’s jungle, in a tree
Before I went into the world in search of other kinds of love
Nobody owned me but a cat named Sloopy.
His name was Rod McKuen. He was the most popular poet in American publishing
history.
Rod McKuen sold millions of poetry books in the 1960s and 1970s. He was a
regular on late-night TV. He released dozens of albums, wrote songs for
Sinatra, and was nominated for two Oscars. He was a flashpoint in the battle
between highbrow and lowbrow, with devotees revering his plain-spoken honesty
and Dick Cavett mockingly calling him “the most understood poet in America.”
Every year on his birthday, he sold out Carnegie Hall."
Via Joyce Donahue and Muse.
Share and enjoy,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
