A Memoir of Robert Huff by Lewis Turco

By Jack Brummet, Poetry Ed.

A sad, but fascinating memoir of one of my poetry mentors, Bob Huff.  Jump here, to Lewis Turco's blog to read the story.  Ed's Note: Turco is also the author/editor of a great poetry reference book--The Book of Forms.

I interviewed Robert Huff in 1977 for a magazine--Jeopardy.  I'll have to dig that up. It was priceless...my clueless questions parried by his snarky answers. That's him, second from the left in the photograph. 

I took two classes and one independent study from Bob. Our "one on ones" were usually conducted at a bar; we met on campus only when he was boxed in by faculty or editing duties. Depending on the level of ethel he was running, he ranged from warm, encouraging, and hilarious to the, well, dark polar opposite. On the whole it was great to spend a few sessions outside the classroom. He was wise about poetry and song and the act of writing. And not so wise about his own situation. Another prof I became friends with at Fairhaven/Western, R.D. Brown, published a mass market mystery novel with a lead character loosely but vividly based on Robert Huff. Bob denied this in the interview, where he said "the only thing I have in common with this cop, Killian, is defensive drinking."

Jerry Melin, Keelin Curran, Nick Gattuccio, Jan Newberry, Kevin Francis Aloysius Curran and I first published two or three poems from what would become his final book (the book and poems are mentioned in the article), in the second issue of our NYC literary magazine, Scape, in 1982.

Ed's note:  My friend Pope Francis mentioned, interestingly, that Miller Williams, another poet at the Breadloaf conference (and pictured above) is the father of the singer-songwriter Lucinda Williams.

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