Kenneth McClane is the author of eight books of poetry, including a volume of collected poems entitled Take Five; he has also written two collections of essays, the second of which, Color, came out earlier this year from University of Notre Dame Press. The recipient of numerous awards for teaching and writing, McClane received his B.A., M.A. and M.F.A. from Cornell, and has taught there since 1976. He earned a Clark Teaching Award in 1983 and become a full professor in 1989. He now lives in Ithaca, NY, and plans to start a non-fiction publishing series, focusing on the works of the disenfranchised.
McClane read from his work on November 12, 2009, in Cornell’s Goldwin Smith Hall. This interview took place earlier the same day.