Upon the release of Kurt Vonnegut’s Look at the Birdie, a collection of previously unpublished stories, the Poetry Center is pleased to share an archival recording of Mr. Vonnegut from May 16, 1983.

“If you are a New Yorker, if you are a writer, it’s part of your civic duty to appear at the Y—at least once,” Mr. Vonnegut says in his opening remarks. As it happens, this was Mr. Vonnegut’s second appearance at the Poetry Center. His first, with poet Muriel Rukeyser, took place some 13 years before, on the evening of May 4, 1970—the day the National Guard opened fire on student protesters at Kent State. That night, he recalls in the recording from 1983, “there were people out in the audience standing up saying, ‘What do we do, what are we supposed to do?’ and nobody had a very bright answer, certainly Muriel and I didn’t.” Mr. Vonnegut ended up reading from a forthcoming novel, Breakfast of Champions, and that recording can be found here.

In the recording from 1983, however, he addresses Kent State much more directly, by reading a speech he delivered at Haverford College shortly after the shootings. He then reads two more speeches—one on our addiction to war preparation and another on nuclear holocaust, which was originally delivered at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine.

In an ongoing effort to share with our readers some of the great literary moments which the Poetry Center has presented across the decades, this blog has begun to feature regular postings of archival recordings by some of the best writers of our time. Next week, in anticipation of her upcoming appearance, on Thursday, October 29th, we will share a recording of A.S. Byatt reading an excerpt from Possession. To purchase tickets to Ms. Byatt’s reading, please click here. For more information about the rest of the upcoming season, please click here. And for access to other recordings from the Poetry Center archive, please click here.

Unterberg Poetry Center webcasts and access to our archive are made possible in part by the generous support of the Sidney E. Frank Foundation.

You can also download the MP3. [19 MB]
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