{"id":891,"date":"2012-01-19T13:32:36","date_gmt":"2012-01-19T17:32:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/?p=891"},"modified":"2013-12-09T15:50:25","modified_gmt":"2013-12-09T19:50:25","slug":"mcnair-to-hall-september-3-1977","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/mcnair-to-hall-september-3-1977\/","title":{"rendered":"McNair to Hall: September 3, 1977"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n
\"Page-1-McNair-to-Hall-9-3-1977\"<\/a>\"Page-2-McNair-to-Hall-9-3-1977\"<\/a>\"Page-3-McNair-to-Hall-9-3-1977\"<\/a>\"Page-4-McNair-to-Hall-9-3-1977\"<\/a><\/p>\n

[Click image to view]<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

September 3, 1977<\/p>\n

Dear Don \u2013<\/p>\n

Rereading your poem Stone Walls<\/span> in Chile late at night
\nmakes me appreciate it more than I ever have before \u2013
\nthe distance has given it more edge, perhaps. I like
\nso much the way you convey that attraction to the past,
\nhow the narrator recalls first the old faces, then the
\nlandscape of the Kearsarge arch itself, juxtaposing that
\nmemory\/dream of the past with the dreams he had then
\nof the future, and finally bringing past and present
\ntogether in that wonderfully joyful and yet sad sound<\/del>
\nSection 4, in which he recalls the \u201cfall\u201d of his
\nyouth as he lives the \u201cfall\u201d of his manhood. (Section 4
\nis, well, masterful, esp. the way it expresses
\nthat essential \u201cconnection\u201d between the n\u2019s past
\nand present through the landscape<\/span>.)<\/p>\n

(New pen) Perhaps it is because I identify
\nwith the n\u2019s attraction to the past, and with his
\nattempt to correct that past (its people, its<\/p>\n

2\/<\/p>\n

landscape, its heretofore unreclaimed self), that I do not so much like
\nSection 7, which seems to me to take the poem beyond its proper
\nconcerns<\/del> oops bounds. I think I know what you are trying to do
\nin that section, but it feels public \u2013 histrionic \u2013 and seems
\nto me to violate the personal and more strictly autobiographical
\nmovement of the poem.<\/p>\n

The poem is, to my mind, an awfully good one, presenting
\na speaker who revives his ancestors and his region from
\nthe death of the past, and through that experience awakens
\nfully alive in the present, where he sees himself moving
\ntoward another death, \u201cthrough the woods\u2026to the village\u201d of his
\nown \u201cnightfall\u201d. Yet there is finally no sadness about his
\nawakening because the cycle of his life, which he dreams
\nreturning to the place of \u201cstone walls\u201d, as \u201cconnected\u201d
\nwith the cycles of other lives, and with the larger \u2013 much
\nlarger \u2013 cycle of the region itself. (Yes, I do understand
\nthat Section 7 contributes to the readers sense of what
\nI\u2019ve just called the \u201clarger cycle of the region\u201d, but I
\nstill wonder about it\u2026)<\/p>\n

All of the above is, of course, offered in a take\u2013it\u2013
\nor\u2013leave\u2013it\u2013you\u2013know\u2013your\u2013own\u2013poem\u2013better\u2013than\u2013I
\nbasis.<\/p>\n

Chile is hard to describe at this point since we<\/p>\n

3\/<\/p>\n

haven\u2019t been here long enough to assimilate it. I
\nhave yet to meet with the \u201cliterary club\u201d of the
\nNorth America Institute here, and have only just met a man who
\nwill soon introduce me to poets, including Nicanor Parra,
\nwho is, by the way, alive and well. My teaching assignment goes
\nswimmingly: graduate students here are bright and very
\ncommitted to American Studies. My campus is beautiful \u2013
\nmedieval\/monastic architecture, several green, flowering
\ncourtyards.<\/p>\n

We assumed there would be a DINA (secret police)
\nofficer on every corner of the Santiago streets, but not so \u2013
\nIn fact, the word here and in Washington is that DINA has
\nbeen disbanded. We read in the Santiago press that
\nCarter and Pinochet (you wondered about the pronunciation
\nof that name \u2013 it\u2019s French, though the Spanish pronounce
\nit PE\u00c9 NOH CHA<\/del>YT) have been conferring in
\nWashington \u2013 Pinochet having been invited to the
\nWhite House to discuss with others the terms of
\nthe Panama Canal treaty. Do you read the same?
\nI have been asked to do a series of lectures
\n(4) at the Cath. U. of Valparaiso, so will soon
\nsee more of the academic network here \u2013 In November,<\/p>\n

4\/<\/p>\n

will be lecturing at the U. of Conception.<\/span><\/p>\n

Maybe these and other activities will tell me more about
\nsocial\/ political realities here \u2013 about such things, my understanding is
\nlimited. Everywhere there are evidences of the Allende period,
\njust passed<\/del> ended: the boards over the windows of the executive
\nmansion, which was bombed by the military; the slogans
\nthat show through the whitewash on city buildings \u2013 and the
\nconversations among the professors of the Catolica (most<\/span>
\nof whom are pro-Junta) about the \u201cCommunist experiment\u201d
\nthat failed. But much more remains to be seen and learned.<\/p>\n

So, more later. In envy you your up-coming
\nseason in NH; would love to be with you, kicking
\nthe leaves, or whatever. Oh well, at least we will not
\nhave a fuel bill here. We think about you both and
\nwould love to hear from you. Til then (as you once
\nsaid to me) \u201cKeep writin\u2019 those poems\u201d!<\/p>\n

Warmest thoughts & regards,<\/p>\n

Wes<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

\n

A note from McNair about this letter:<\/span> <\/em><\/strong>I wrote this letter about the \u201cnot-so-monstrous\u201d military junta in Chile before I witnessed a small group of demonstrators in downtown Santiago, their leader holding a script that shook in his hand as he read from it, determined yet clearly frightened. The military police quickly turned up with their sirens, forced the demonstrators into two vans, and streaked away.<\/p>\n\n

\n <\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Click image to view] September 3, 1977 Dear Don \u2013 Rereading your poem Stone Walls in Chile late at night makes me appreciate it more than I ever have before \u2013 the distance has given it more edge, perhaps. I like so much the way you convey that attraction to the past, how the narrator […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2341,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27136,35504,35505,42963,293],"tags":[],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/891"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2341"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=891"}],"version-history":[{"count":27,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/891\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1304,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/891\/revisions\/1304"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/csc-mcnair\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}