Author Archives: Andrew Epstein

“Ninth Street Women”: The New York School (of Painters, Mostly) Comes to TV

Posted on April 25, 2019

Those of us who have been hoping for years for a Frank O’Hara biopic or Netflix mini-series devoted to the New York School poets will have to wait, but there is exciting news in this department: Amazon just announced that … Continue reading →

Posted in Abstract Expressionism, Elaine de Kooning, Frank O'Hara, Franz Kline, Grace Hartigan, Hans Hoffmann, Helen Frankenthaler, Jackson Pollock, James Schuyler, Joan Mitchell, John Ashbery, Lee Krasner, Television, Visual Art, Willem de Kooning | Leave a comment

Frank O’Hara as a Jeopardy! Clue

Posted on April 21, 2019

The list of poets who are well-known enough to appear in a question on a television trivia game show is relatively short.  Games like Jeopardy! frequently feature questions about old standbys like Homer, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Byron, Pound, Yeats, Hughes, … Continue reading →

Posted in Frank O'Hara, John Ashbery, Robert Creeley, Television | Leave a comment

Frank O’Hara and Indie Punk (Having a Coke with Martha)

Posted on April 16, 2019

Longtime readers of this blog probably know I’m always on the lookout for moments when Frank O’Hara or other poets of the New York School pop up in the world of music.  O’Hara, especially, continues to haunt the history and … Continue reading →

Posted in Frank O'Hara, Grace Hartigan, Lou Reed, Music, NY School Influence, Patti Smith, Thurston Moore, Visual Art | Leave a comment

The Power of Not Being Sure: John Ashbery, Jordan Ellenberg, and Math

Posted on March 28, 2019

To my surprise, in the car the other day my math-obsessed 14-year-old son Dylan suddenly exclaimed “John Ashbery!” from the backseat.  It turns out he’d reached the last pages of Jordan Ellenberg’s 2014 book How Not To Be Wrong: The Power … Continue reading →

Posted in John Ashbery | 2 Comments

Falling in Love with Frank O’Hara (via Instagram)

Posted on February 22, 2019

The writer Sinead Stubbins has a charming article in the Guardian today about how she, like so many others, came to fall in love with the poetry of Frank O’Hara.  The piece also suggests the new, digital byways that lead people … Continue reading →

Posted in Frank O'Hara, Mad Men, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Walt Whitman, William Carlos Williams | Leave a comment

“A Frank O’Hara Notebook” by Bill Berkson

Posted on January 3, 2019

When the poet and art critic Bill Berkson passed away in 2016, he left behind a notebook full of fragments and notes about his close and decisive friendship with Frank O’Hara.  Apparently, he had been planning for many years to … Continue reading →

Posted in Arthur Rimbaud, Bill Berkson, Books, Frank O'Hara, Jack Kerouac, Jane Freilicher, Kenneth Koch, William Carlos Williams | 1 Comment

Happy 40th Birthday to Midwinter Day (by Bernadette Mayer)

Posted on December 22, 2018

“I had an idea to write a book that would … prove the day like the dream has everything in it.” — Bernadette Mayer, Midwinter Day Today marks the 40th anniversary of an important moment in twentieth-century poetry — the … Continue reading →

Posted in Bernadette Mayer, Charles Olson, Claudia Rankine, Ezra Pound, Frank O'Hara, James Joyce, Lewis Warsh, NY School Influence, William Carlos Williams | 2 Comments