Sunday Feature: Thom Gunn - Appropriate Measures

Author Colm Toibin profiles Anglo-American poet Thom Gunn, whose tightly-wrought poetry imposed control and order upon his hedonistic lifestyle. Toibin, who grew up furtively reading Gunn in a society where his own homosexuality was officially proscribed, explains the themes of control and experience in Gunn's work, and explores the single most shattering event in the poet's life: the suicide of his mother. Toibin argues that this, which happened when Gunn was only 15, precipitated the outpouring of his mature poetry and construction of his poetic identity. With contributions from Mike Kitay, Bob Bair, August Kleinzahler, Clive Wilmer, Wendy Lesser, Joshua Weiner, Tom Sleigh, Anne Winters, Jim Powell and Don Baird