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Muldoon book selected for international poetry prize

"Moy Sand and Gravel," the latest collection of poetry by Princeton's Paul Muldoon, has been selected for the 2003 Griffin Poetry Prize.

The Toronto-based Griffin prize is awarded annually for the two best books of poetry published in English the previous year anywhere in the world.

The book by Muldoon, the Howard Clark '21 University Professor in the Humanities, won in the "international" category. "Concrete and Wild Carrot" by Margaret Avison won in the Canadian category. The winners in each category receive $40,000 (Canadian). A selection of poems from the books shortlisted for the award will be included in the Griffin Poetry Prize Anthology.

"Reading Paul Muldoon's poetry is like looking through a kaleidoscope while he jiggles your elbow," the judges wrote in their citation for the award. "The complex rhyme-schemes, the repeated words and phrases, the refrains, the wonderful patterning unexpectedly dislocate this poet's deep sense of place and shuttle the reader between order and chaos and back again."

Earlier this year, "Moy Sand and Gravel" was selected for the Pulitzer Prize in poetry. A story about a new interactive study of a poem from the book appears in the Princeton Weekly Bulletin. A selection of poems from this book can be read online, as well.

An Educational Technologies Center team has collaborated with Paul Muldoon in creating an online exploration of one of the Princeton professor's poems, "A Collegelands Catechism." The site is available to alumni and members of the campus community.

image: Educational Technologies Center