Cole Swensen

Poet

Cole Swensen is a contemporary poet known for her innovative exploration of nature and perception, particularly in her work 'Green.'

Born
April 29, 1955
Quotes
6
Rank
#5745

About Cole Swensen

Cole Swensen — Life and Legacy

Cole Swensen is a prominent poet whose work intricately weaves themes of nature and perception, establishing her as a distinctive voice in contemporary literature. Her collection 'Green' exemplifies her ability to blend the physical landscape with emotional resonance, inviting readers to engage with the world in nuanced ways. Swensen's core philosophy revolves around the idea that our understanding of nature is deeply intertwined with language and perception. In her poetry, she often reflects on how words can both reveal and obscure the essence of the natural world. For instance, her assertion that 'the world is a place of wonder' encourages readers to look beyond the ordinary and appreciate the complexities of their surroundings. This perspective challenges conventional views, urging a deeper contemplation of our relationship with nature. The relevance of Swensen's quotes and ideas continues to resonate today, as they prompt readers to reconsider their perceptions and the language they use to describe their experiences. Her work not only enriches the literary landscape but also fosters a greater appreciation for the intricate connections between humanity and the natural environment.

Quote collection

Cole Swensen quotes

6 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.

Cole Swensen Poet
Popular

"At the end of any of my project I miss the material. I pick subjects I love and then get very engaged with them, so stopping that engagement often feels odd and arbitrary, but there's a moment when I don't want to change anything else and when the shape and length feels right. At that point, continuing would be destructive."

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Cole Swensen Poet
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"Being in unfamiliar places has no effect on my writing, except that it often means I'm caught up in the logistics of travel, the places and people on the spot, etc., etc., which can mean that I don't have the time to write. But I try, wherever I am, to take a couple of hours in the early evening to go off and write. Because I never write from personal experience, per se, where I am makes no difference except for this element of available time."

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Cole Swensen Poet
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"If you're deeply engaged in an event, you're part of it. But if you're outside of it, disinterested, you are the regard that registers history. And that disinterestedness is different from objectivity. The objective view sees only the event, while the disinterested one participates as well as views by creating that link to history. It's a type of viewing that's both inside and out of the event, that brings to the viewing the capacity for human emotion, for compassion, but holds it openly. And objectivity excludes the human element, and is therefore not a point of view open to humans."

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Cole Swensen Poet
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"I've always been interested in the principle of the fractal, which is typified by self-similarity across scale, which both puts a lot of pressure on a specific viewer's perspective and opens up the number of "correct" viewing positions infinitely, in this way thwarting the power-related implications of traditional, Renaissance single-point perspective."

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Cole Swensen Poet
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"Rather than thinking of sound and sense in my essays as two opposing principles, two perpendicular trajectories, as they are often considered in conversations around translation, or even as two disassociated phenomena that can be brought together to collaborate with more or less success, I think of sound as sense. Sound has its own meaning, and it's one of the many non-semantic dimensions of meaning in language. I want to emphasize is the formal dynamic between language-as-information and language-as-art-material."

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Cole Swensen Poet
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"My focus is on the rhythmic relationship between body and ground and the visual relationships among the elements of the always-changing scene."

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