Thank you, Robin Metz
I wasted away so much time in college. I went to Knox College from 1969 to 1973, the ripe college campus counter culture years, at least at Knox, and I had a lot of counter culture fun. And once I figured out the professors had become so radical about the Vietnam War that they wouldn’t flunk me and take away my student deferment, I stopped going to class and had even more fun.
So I played soccer, and I partied, and I wasted so much precious opportunity.
But there was one opportunity I did respect, that I cherished even, which was attending every Creative Writing class I could with Robin Metz. All by itself the time I spent with Robin could very well redeem those college years.
Robin arrived at Knox in his mid-20’s with his brand new MFA from The Writer’s Workshop at the University of Iowa, after playing football as an undergrad at Princeton–in high school, in the Pittsburgh steel mill heydays, he played football against Mike Ditka.
He quickly became a very popular professor for the best reasons–he was determined to help his students grow, to flourish even. He approached my first short stories about my times guiding with tough minded respect–he found an authentic voice in the stories as he showed me that I was explaining what I should be portraying. Toward the end of my time there he began treating me as a colleague, and his confidence in my talent was my singular success as a writer.
Robin was an acclaimed short story writer when I was his student, and later became a renowned poet. A collection of his poetry, Unbidden Angel, was Nominated for the Guardian of London Book of the Year Award and won the Rainer Maria Rilke International Poetry Prize in 2000. He has been American Poet in Residence in Nepal, India, and Kosvo.
Ain’t that’s about the coolest thing one could do, be the Poet in Residence in Nepal?
Robin and I have stayed in touch. He and his wife Elizabeth Carlin Metz are the producer and director of the Vitalist Theater in Chicago, and they adapted Anung for the stage and gave is a six week run four years ago.
He still teaches at Knox. In fact my youngest daughter, Krista Anne, took three or four classes with him. We all love him, and I appreciate the chance to tell all I can that he has served the world with grace and humor and I am one of many ever in his debt.