Pulitzer Prize winning poet and playwright Archibald MacLeish was born on May 7, 1892. MacLeish, who served as Librarian of Congress from 1939-44, spent several days at the University of Arizona in November 1965. He died in 1982.

He was a guest of the Ruth Stephan Poetry Center. When MacLeish was in Tucson his schedule included a meeting with reporters, attendance at a formal recital of his work by UA students and his own presentation in the main auditorium.

When talking to the press, MacLeish said that radio was an ideal medium for verse. Without visual distractions, he said, radio drama set the imagination of the listener free. By contrast, he saw little hope for traditional drama, verse or prose on television. “I don’t think anyone has yet learned how to use the TV screen imaginatively.”

He praised the UA Speech Department’s presentation of two of his verse-plays, “The Trojan Horse” and “This Music Crept by Me Upon the Waters.”

The Star review was a little less polite to MacLeish’s own reading of his work. “MacLeish read with vigor and resonance from some of his poems. However, a number of the poems lost vitality and immediacy because of the vastness of the UA auditorium. Certain ones also seemed somewhat dated in concept and technique.”

“In a small excerpt from his poem about Odysseus, the poet has fashioned images of great beauty and richness. But he tended to read all of his poetry with a tremendous hum which became rather monotonous.”

The following MacLeish poem was published in the Star on September 9, 1973.

Conversation in a belfry

Centennial bell that will not ring,
tell me why your iron tongue
rusts in the rain, your mouth is dumb.
Why are you silent, bell?

For shame.
You are not shamed. Not I but you.
We? With all we’ve done and do?
We’ve ruled ourselves two hundred years.
No name on earth is proud as ours. It was your fathers’ pride that ruled:
their sons are tricked and lied to, fooled
as Lincoln thought no people could be,
all of them – always – for their good!
But still we’re free. Ring out! O ring! What man is free when fraud is king?
Our souls are ours: our minds our own. Your master listens on the telephone.
We govern. It is we decide. You to whom your government has lied!
Ring out and all will understand
This is John Adams’ well-loved land … John Adams would have seen you damned.
… where Jefferson’s immortal word … Jefferson’s immortal word
is yet to hear. It will be heard
but not by those who sell his soul.
You ring now, bell. I toll. I toll.

— by Archibald MacLeish