Jan Barry
"I have pulled from my shelf a slim volume of poems edited by Jan Barry, Larry Rottmann, and Basil T. Parquet in 1972, which was for me a touchstone in those war years, a way inside Vietnam’s reality, as it was for many: Winning Hearts and Minds: War Poems by Vietnam Veterans."
--Eleanor Wilner, Poetry magazine, Oct. 2004 Jan Barry "is perhaps the single most important figure in the emergence of Vietnam veterans' poetry, not only for his own pioneering poems but especially for his tireless efforts to encourage and promote the work of others." --W.D. Ehrhart, Soldier-Poets of the Vietnam War "When Jan Barry ... speaks to students in Vietnam courses, he describes his working-class youth in upstate New York when 'the last thing I would ever think of being was a poet' ... But what he, along with many others, discovered in Vietnam was that 'poetry saved my life.' He then explains how poetry, by expressing what seemed most inexpressible about the war, has led many to healing." --H. Bruce Franklin, The Vietnam War in American Stories, Songs, and Poems |
My Works
Wild Life: Seneca white deer, Romulus, NY
Wild Life
(MyPublisher.com, 2009) Photography: Nature's other creatures give me goose bumps when I ramble outdoors and catch such scenes as these. Finger Lakes & Gorges
(MyPublisher.com, 2007) Photography: Here is where I was born and each summer return to recharge, reflect and rediscover who I am. Earth Songs: New & Selected Poems
(iUniverse, 2003) This collection of poems unveils extraordinary views of the world discovered by a soldier-turned-poet amid a bitter war and brittle peace. From flowers blooming in battle zones to a dying love's parting words, these poems crackle with life amid death, a storyteller's own true song. "'Earth Songs' invites the reader to experience war for what it really is: an insane activity of patriotic carnage...the poet lets his journalist's eye survey all the madness he sees and then uses the professional's pen to edit out the hearsay so only the news--and truth--remains." --Charles H. Johnson, Home News Tribune, 2/29/04 A Citizen's Guide to Grassroots Campaigns
(Rutgers University Press, 2000) A wealth of practical information on the elements of an effective civic campaign -- including organizing, public speaking, lobbying, publicity, and more -- by a community service award-winning journalist. "...a blast of fresh air, a wake-up reminder that the really great things in our world are built bit by bit by everyday folks like you and me....here's a straightforward, down-to-earth guide to how you too can make your mark." --Michael Shafer, Director, Citizenship and Service Education Program, Rutgers University Peace Is Our Profession: Poems and Passages of War Protest
Edited by Jan Barry (East River Anthology, 1981) A fiery selection of literature and artwork by American and Vietnamese war protesters, many of whom were soldiers who turned against the fighting, civilians who braved the fire on peace missions, poet-activists, activists-turned-public dramatists, conscientious objectors in and out of uniform. Demilitarized Zones: Veterans After Vietnam
Edited by Jan Barry and W.D. Ehrhart (East River Anthology, 1976) Hard-bitten, bitter, brash, and black humor poetry and prose, art and photography by veterans of Vietnam and other wars. Winning Hearts & Minds: War Poems by Vietnam Veterans
Edited by Larry Rottmann, Jan Barry, and Basil T. Paquet (1st Casualty Press/McGraw-Hill, 1972) "A book of poems and art that say more than any correspondent can about Vietnam." --Herbert Mitgang, New York Times "...the most eloquent statement of what the war is that I have seen from its participants." --Peter S. Prescott, Newsweek Selected Essays
"The End of Art: Poetry and Nuclear War,"The Nightmare Considered: Critical Studies of Nuclear War Literature (Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1991) and Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism(Gale Research, 1993)
"From War to Peace: Changing the Culture," Unwinding the Vietnam War (Real Comet Press/Washington Project for the Arts, 1987) "A Generation of Peace," review in Dictionary of Literary Biography: American Writers of the Vietnam War (Gale Research, 1991) "The Pen is Mightier than the Sword: How What You Write Can Make a Difference,"The Insider's Guide to Book Editors and Publishers (Prima, 1990) "Troubling Questions About Dioxin," The New York Times (Sept. 11, 1983) "War and Literature," review of The Madness of it All: Essays on War, Literature and American Life, by W.D. Ehrhart, in The Virginia Quarterly Review, Summer 2003 “Why Veterans March Against the War,” op-ed essay in The New York Times (April 23, 1971) Selected Poetry
"The Longest War"
The longest war is over Or so they say Again But I can still hear the gunfire Every night From My bed. The longest nightmare Never seems to Ever Quite come To An end. This was one of my first published poems, written in the winter of 1971. It appeared in Winning Hearts & Minds, The New York Times, and many other places. I was especially delighted when it appeared in A People and a Nation: A History of the United States, because when I was growing up poems in history books were by long-dead poets. "Requiem"
Fallen butterfly crumpled amid fallen leaves. Such tiny exquisite beauty to feed the winter trees. This poem was published in Emerson of Harvard: A Celebrative Bicentennial Anthology to Ralph Waldo Emerson (Quill Books, 2003). It's also in Earth Songs, the coda of a section on my wife's death. Ralph Waldo Emerson's essays and poetry were a big influence on my development as a writer and poet. Poems in Anthologies Carrying the Darkness: The Poetry of the Vietnam War (Texas Tech University Press, 1989) From Both Sides Now: The Poetry of the Vietnam War and its Aftermath (Scribner, 1998) Hearts and Minds: Bodies, Poetry, and Resistance in the Vietnam Era (Rutgers University Press, 1996) Radical Visions: Poetry by Vietnam Veterans (University of Georgia Press, 1994) Times of Change: Vietnam and the 60s (Perfection Learning, 2001) Unaccustomed Mercy: Soldier-Poets of the Vietnam War (Texas Tech University Press, 1989) Vietnam Anthology: American War Literature (Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1987) The Vietnam War in American Stories, Songs and Poems (Bedford Books, 1996) Welkom in Zonnig Saigon: Oorlogspoezie van Vietnam veteranen (Uitgeverij Contact Amsterdam, 1974) |
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