Your shopping cart is empty.

Wisconsin People & Ideas – Winter 2015

In this issue: Science, art, and tornadoes come together for small problems, BIG TROUBLE. New Wisconsin Women Making History website shares their stories, our legacy. Poet and Academy Fellow Robin Chapman goes in search of poems in wild places. New Wisconsin Poet Laureate Kimberly Blaeser shares some personal history and insight into the transformative power of poetry. A tour of the "Sparta Zoo" and the Waterways exhibition at the James Watrous Gallery. Fiction from a first-time author and poetry from a couple of grizzled veteran poets as well as book reviews of new Wisconsin titles, harangues on the Wisconsin Idea and the state of Wisconsin fiction from editor Jason A. Smith, and more.

Volume:

Issue Number:

Editors Note

Creatures of reason, seekers of beauty

By:

Linda Ware

Years ago, a student asked me at orientation what qualities he would need to be successful in my Freshman English class. I came up with three.

Editors Note

What's the big idea?

By:

Jason Smith

As a result of the legislative “drafting error” that lead to the deletion of the Wisconsin Idea from the budget, millions of people now know about it. Or do they?

Happenings

Their Stories—Our Legacy

By:

Helen Klebesadel

Wisconsin Women Making History shares the stories and accomplishments of Wisconsin women who, for various reasons, are less known or acknowledged than they should be.

Developed by a visual artist and earth scientist, small problems, BIG TROUBLE was developed to create awareness of subjects that are small in scale (e.g. soil, parasites, dust, viruses, micro pollutants, invasive species) yet can pose significant threats to human life.

Happenings

Art and Science Collaboration Explores Small Problems, Big Trouble

By:

Jason Smith

It was a tornado that forged an almost twenty-year collaboration between Appleton-area artist Judith Waller and scientist James Brey.

Happenings

Performing Arts Medicine Program Performing Artfully in Medicine

By:

Zachary Carlson

A new program at the UW Hospital is helping performers find medical care tailored for their special requirements—and talents.

Fellows Forum

Walking in Wild Places

By:

Robin Chapman

Wisconsin Academy Fellow and poet Robin Chapman shares two poems about the same piece of land in Wisconsin’s Marquette County, written thirty years apart, that visit and revisit a hillside remnant prairie and oak woods about two miles from...

Essay

Fiberglass Menagerie

By:

Paul Lukas, Heather McCabe

Where some might see a big field of junk, FAST Company owner Darren Schauf sees the lifeblood of his business

Kimberly Blaeser, the Wisconsin Poet Laureate

Profile

A Gift Given, A Gift Returned

By:

Elizabeth Wyckoff, Kimberly M. Blaeser

Wisconsin Poet Laureate Kimberly Blaeser's connection with Wisconsin is rooted in a spiritual engagement with place.

Fiction

Swimming to Saba

By:

Shaun Melarvie

The seagull glides over me, surprisingly clear and large, onyx eyes looking down, black-tipped wings outstretched, its fractured shivering shape a reflection in the water—except that I’m looking at it from the other side.

Book Review

The Heart of Things: A Midwestern Almanac, by John Hildebrand

By:

Elizabeth Wyckoff

With humor and admiration, John Hildebrand focuses on the “solid, physical detail around which the intangible clings” to conjure a sense of the Midwest.