Remembering Pulitzer-winning poet Charles Simic

Transcript

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Amna Nawaz: Finally tonight, we remember poet Charles Simic, who died yesterday.

He was a prolific writer, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, and served as poet laureate of the United States, an honor made all the more remarkable by the fact that he came to this country in his teens. He often wrote with both bite and humor of the World War II era, of his childhood in Serbia, as well as his early years in communist Yugoslavia.

He spoke about all of this to Jeffrey Brown at his home in New Hampshire in 2007.

Charles Simic, Poet: I used to joke, I used to say, Hitler and Stalin, it’s thanks to them that I became an American poet.

Jeffrey Brown: The sense of history is everywhere in your writing, in your poetry, and in your prose.

Charles Simic: I remember I wrote once a poem, and about the Bosnian War in the ’90s.

And there was just a — quite a little bit of sort of footage of a woman was two little kids, and she’s running down the road, some road. God knows who she is or where she’s going. I said, well, this is me and my mother, and my brother running. And it just repeats itself.

So, yes, I mean, the poet is the one — my kind of poet is the one who notices such things.

Amna Nawaz: Charles Simic was 84 years old.

And you can find much more online, including Jeff Brown’s full interview with Simic. That is at PBS.org/NewsHour.

Geoff Bennett: And that is the “NewsHour” for tonight.

Join us again here tomorrow night, where we will have more on Americans installing heat pumps, in hopes of reducing their utility bills and helping the planet.

I’m Geoff Bennett.

Amna Nawaz: And I’m Amna Nawaz.

On behalf of the entire “NewsHour” team, thank you for joining us.