Also a Poet, 50 Years Later
Frank O’Hara, Poet Among Painters, Marjorie Perloff 1998, University of Chicago Press, with a new introduction O’Hara was about intense friendships. Actually he was about many things: art, dance, classical music, travel, gay theater, movies. He was about the exclamation point. It is the singular fingerprint of his work. How many of us grew up, in school being told the exclamation point was to be used rarely, in instances of the extreme. Indeed, I once sneaked a peek (okay, I was spying)at a roommate’s diary, a girl I didn’t like and liked even less when I saw the page covered in exclamation points. She was as shallow as I suspected, is what I told myself. The (exclamation) point is she probably was, exclamation points aside. So I planned to be careful, judicious, barely rising above a whisper. Early Jane Hertenstein work does not display an ounce of exuberance. Then I discovered Frank O’Hara, and the fun began. I could be playful, fey, charming, bantering a...