20 Maine Poets

New website brought to you by Wes

This is to announce the launch of a new website called 20 Maine Poets Read and Discuss Their Work. To access the site, simply click here http://wpsites.maine.edu/20poets/.

Prepared by former Maine Poet Laureate Wesley McNair with the help of the technical staff at the University of Maine at Farmington, the website features videos of a variety of Maine’s contemporary poets, who read two poems apiece selected from their work and discuss where their poetry comes from and how they write it..

The website’s videos are supplemented by biographies of the poets and a special section called “In Memoriam,“ offering samples of work by five poets who died during McNair’s laureateship. The site will give general readers an appreciation for the richness and diversity of today’s Maine poetry. It will also provide teachers and students with an important online resource for coursework in creative writing and Maine literature.

20 Maine Poets Read and Discuss Their Work is the culmination of a statewide initiative McNair began as poet laureate. Future links on the website will feature  videos, readings and activities derived from his other initiatives, including “Take Heart: A Conversation in Poetry,” “The Maine Poetry Express,” and “Written Word, Spoken Word and Hip-Hop.” Stay tuned!