Robert Frost Festival | Suite101.com

Posted by
Linda Sue Grimes
Mar 2, 2007

Robert Frost is, without doubt, the most recognizable name in American poetry. His poetry earned him four Pulitzer Prizes. He was invited to read a poem at the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy. The poem Frost read, titled “The Gift Outright,” is one he wrote during one of his visits to the Keys.

The Robert Festival will feature presentations, workshops, readings, films, and even a sunset poetry cruise. It will also announce of the winners of the Robert Frost Poetry Festival international haiku and poetry contests.

Poems and Politics

Frost first met with publishing success in England, after unsuccessfully trying to publish in America.

Frost traveled to the Soviet Union with a good-will group in 1962, and he talked with Premier Nikita Khrushchev. About the Premier, Frost reported that he was “no fat-head” and that he was “not a coward.” The poet also said that the Soviet leader had quipped that America was “too liberal to fight.” That remark, it is gossiped, caused a stir in Washington.

For the Kennedy inauguration, Frost had actually penned a new poem, but when he tried to read it at the ceremony, the sun was too bright, and he could not see to read it that January day, so he recited his old poem, “The Gift Outright.”

Robert Frost died January 29, 1963 in Boston. After Frost death, President Kennedy later praised him in a speech at Amherst College, saying, “The death of Robert Frost leaves a vacancy in the American spirit....His death impoverishes us all; but he has bequeathed his Nation a body of imperishable verse from which Americans will forever gain joy and understanding.”