October 3, 1954

Talk With Mr. Stevens

By LEWIS NICHOLS

artford, Conn. Even in this city of calculated risk, the office of the Hartford Accident and Indemnity Company is an imposing structure. Its first floor executive rooms also are awesome, with rugs, glass-topped desks and a silence suitable for those who deal with the subtleties of insurance. But midway down the corridor there is a room from which booms a hearty laugh. This is not an anachronism, this is a poet. Wallace Stevens is the name. In the building, he bears the title of vice president, and affixes his signature to such matters of surety claims as merit it. Outside, he affixes the same signature to work clearly meriting the "Collected Poems," as published yesterday to coincide with his seventy-fifth birthday. But he is no Jekyll-Hyde. Regarding the inevitable work-by-day, muse-by-night question which he has been asked for upward of forty years: "I've always skipped answering that. I prefer to think I'm just a man, not a poet part time, business man the rest. This is a fortunate thing, considering how inconsiderate the ravens are. I don't divide my life, just go on living. "Anyway, here I deal with surety claims--claims on surety bonds. Poetry and surety claims aren't as unlikely a combination as they may seem. There's nothing perfunctory about them for each case is different." This surety poet, who is just a man, is surely a lot of the latter. He is tall, heavy without being ponderous, has a close-cropped gray crewcut. His face is of the type which can be imagined equally at home dressed with a Santa Claus beard and entertaining grandchildren, or, with professional sternness dressing down malingerers. He is amused by many things, expresses whimsical conceits, laughs. Poetry--and surety claims-he takes seriously: Wallace Stevens he has known long enough not to take seriously. If he ever did, which seems a little doubtful. Jekyll-Hyde out of the way, what about poetic method in the hours allotted thereto? "There is no procedure," he said. "I just write poetry when I feel like it. I write best when I can concentrate, and do that best while walking. Any number of poems have been written on the way from the

house to the office/ I carry slips of paper in my pocket and put down ideas and notes. Then I hand the notes to Miss Flynn (come in, Miss Flynn, I'd like you to meet a friend), and she types them out. "They're pretty indecipherable when she gets them. When they're typed out, they go in the folder over there. I prefer to keep a poem until I've completely forgotten it, then revise it. "But I don't revise much. Anything I've finally gotten out, I'd be reluctant to change. A change resulting from no more than forced labor is not the right thing for poetry." About subject matter--as dreamed on, sent from heaven or editorially commissioned--Mr. Stevens knows only that the last source is not for Hartford. "I avoid writing things because someone wants them on particular subjects," he said. "That's the wrong beginning, and I don't like artificial ideas. The only value to yourself in respect to any poem is that it shall be true. To me, poetry is a very important sanction to life--life from which traditional sanctions are disappearing. Nor does Mr. Stevens believe that in any assemblage of oncoming souls, certain ones are earmarked for ownership of publishable muse. "There's nothing to that saying that poets are born," he said. "They're not born in particular. Everyone is born. Some of those who are born are interested in poetry, that's all. "I'm no different from anyone else, just a run of the mine person. I like painting, books, poems. In my younger days I liked girls. But let's not stress that. I have a wife." There are a few other pertinent--or maybe impertinent--matters about the bard of surety claims: (1) A number of poems in the collection mentioned guitars. He used to play but "haven't touched one in fifty years. Means nothing. Recently I wrote a poem about a banjo. I've never played a banjo." (2) A number of others mentioned faraway places. "Means nothing. I always say I've never been anywhere except Staten Island." (3) Lunch. Mr. Stevens never eats it, save once a week to break up the monotony. On that day, he goes to the Canoe Club. To a visitor from the Hudson, the name suggests that perhaps the Connecticut River shore still clings to old, stately customs, possibly with crinoline and parasol and forgotten, genteel ways. "Only the disreputable go there," said Mr. Stevens with satisfaction. "The single canoe's a stuffed one, and hangs on the wall."