March 16 — Authorities in Saudi Arabia arrest and jail poet Abdul Mohsen Musalam and dismiss a newspaper editor following the publication of Musalam's poem "The Corrupt on Earth" which criticizes the state's Islamic judiciary, accusing some judges of being corrupt and issuing unfair rulings for their own personal benefit.
August 22 — Poet Ron Silliman starts his popular and controversial weblogSilliman's Blog which will become one of the most popular blogs devoted largely to contemporary poetry and poetics. (By August 2006, the blog will reach a total of 800,000 hits and get its next 100,000 by early November.).[1]
September — Amiri Baraka (b. 1934), an African-American poet and political activist from Newark, New Jersey who was appointed the second Poet Laureate of New Jersey, ignites a controversy and accusations of anti-Semitism with a public reading of "Somebody Blew Up America" at the Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival near Stanhope, New Jersey.[2] Baraka's poem discusses the September 11 attacks in a way that is highly critical of racism in America, includes angry depictions of public figures such as Rudolph Giuliani, Trent Lott, Clarence Thomas, Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell and Ward Connerly, accuses Israel of involvement in the World Trade Center attacks, and supports the theory that the United States government knew about the attacks in advance. Amid public outrage and pressure from state leaders, Baraka is asked to resign as the Poet Laureate by New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey who had appointed him to the post two months earlier. Baraka refuses[3] and, because there is no legal mechanism provided in the law to remove him as poet laureate, the state legislature and governor abolishes the position to remove him effective 2 July 2003.[4]
After Ghazi al-Gosaibi, the Saudi Arabian ambassador to Britain, publishes a poem praising a suicide bomber who had killed himself and two Israelis after blowing himself up in a supermarket, the ambassador is recalled home.[5]
Meena Alexander, Illiterate Heart ( Poetry in English ), Evanston, Illinois: TriQuarterly Books/Northwestern University Press, by an Indian writing, living, and publishing in the United States[12]
Best New Zealand Poems series, an annual online anthology, is started this year with Iain Sharp as the first annual editor. Twenty-five poems by 25 New Zealand poets are selected from the previous year. The first selection is called Best New Zealand Poetry 2001. Unlike The Best American Poetry series, the year named in each edition refers to the year the poems were originally published, not the following year, when the collection is put together and made public. Sharp chose poems published in 2001 from these poets:
Ted Hughes, Selected Poems, 1957–1994 (Farrar, Straus & Giroux); a New York Times "notable book of the year"
Glyn Maxwell, The Nerve (Houghton Mifflin); a New York Times "notable book of the year" (British poet living in America, poetry editor of The New Republic magazine)
Meena Alexander, Illiterate Heart, Evanston, Illinois: TriQuarterly Books/Northwestern University Press, by an Indian writing living in and published in the United States[12]
Abba Kovner, Sloan-Kettering: Poems (Schocken); a New York Times "notable book of the year"
Brad Leithauser, Darlington's Fall: A Novel in Verse (Knopf); a 5,700-line verse novel in 10-line stanzas, irregularly rhymed; a New York Times "notable book of the year"
Glyn Maxwell, The Nerve (Houghton Mifflin); a New York Times "notable book of the year" (British poet living in America, poetry editor of The New Republic magazine)
J.D. McClatchy, Hazmat: Poems (Knopf); a New York Times "notable book of the year"
Czesław Miłosz, New and Collected Poems: 1931–2001 (Ecco/HarperCollins); a New York Times "notable book of the year"
Chris Wallace-Crabbe, La Poésie Australienne, Valenciennes: Presses Universitaires, (with Simone Kadi), French translation of the work of this Australian poet
India
In each section, listed in alphabetical order by first name:
Hindi
Gulzar, Raat Pashmine Ki, New Delhi: Rupa& Co.; in both Urdu and Hindi[34]
^In his blog entry for Saturday, November 04, 2006 link here Silliman takes note of the following statistics: "In 2002–03, it took 50 weeks to get the first 50,000 visits. The last 100,000 came in just 14 (weeks)".
^Pearce, Jeremy (2003-02-09). "When poetry seems to matter". The New York Times.
^Purdy, Matthew (2002-09-28). "New Jersey Laureate Refuses to Resign Over Poem". The New York Times.
^New Jersey State Legislature. "An Act concerning the State poet laureate and repealing P.L.1999, c.228." from Laws of the State of New Jersey (P.L.2003, c.123). Approved 2 July 2003. Retrieved 26 June 2013.
^"Edinburgh's Makars". Edinburgh, UNESCO City of Literature. City of Literature Trust. 2006. Archived from the original on 2008-12-28. Retrieved 2013-02-25.
^O’Reilly, Elizabeth (either author of the "Critical Perspective" section or of the entire contents of the web page, titled "Carol Ann Duffy"at Contemporary Poets website, retrieved May 4, 2009. 2009-05-08.
^[2] Web page titled "Books by Fenton" at the James Fenton Web site, accessed October 11, 2007
^Web page titled "Pierre Nepveu"Archived November 25, 2009, at the Wayback Machine at L’Académie des lettres du Québec website (in French), retrieved October 20, 2010
^Web page titled "Jean Royer"Archived 2011-07-06 at the Wayback Machine at L’Académie des lettres du Québec website (in French), retrieved October 20, 2010
^ abWeb page titled "Gulzar" at the "Poetry International" website, retrieved July 10, 2010
^Web page titled "Kunwar Narain" at the "Poetry International" website, retrieved July 12, 2010
^Web page titled "Rituraj"Archived April 6, 2012, at the Wayback Machine at the "Poetry International" website, retrieved July 12, 2010
^Web page titled "Yash Sharma" at the Poetry International website, retrieved August 3, 2010
^Web pages titled "Lipska Ewa" (in EnglishArchived 2011-09-16 at the Wayback Machine and PolishArchived 2011-07-18 at the Wayback Machine), at the Instytut Książki ("Books Institute") website , "Bibliography" sections, retrieved March 1, 2010
^Web pages titled "Miłosz Czesław" (both English versionArchived 2011-09-16 at the Wayback Machine [for translated titles] and Polish versionArchived 2011-07-18 at the Wayback Machine [for diacritical marks]), at the Institute Ksiazki ("Book Institute") website, "Bibliography: Poetry" section, retrieved February 26, 2010
^Web pages titled "Tadeusz Rozewicz" (in EnglishArchived 2012-03-03 at the Wayback Machine and PolishArchived 2011-07-18 at the Wayback Machine), at the Instytut Książki ("Books Institute") website , "Bibliography" sections, retrieved February 28, 2010
