She no look Italian.
Posted on 04/17/2007 5:52:13 PM PDT by subbob
“We are Virginia Tech. We are sad today and we will be sad for quite awhile. WE are not moving on, we are embracing our mourning. We are Virginia Tech. We are strong enough to know when to cry and sad enough to know we must laugh again. We are Virginia Tech. We do not understand this tragedy. We know we did not deserve it but neither does a child in Africa dying of AIDS, but neither do the invisible children walking the night to avoid being captured by a rogue army. Neither does the baby elephant watching his community be devastated for ivory; neither does the Appalachian infant in the killed in the middle of the night in his crib in the home his father built with his own hands being run over by a boulder because the land was destabilized. No one deserves a tragedy. We are Virginia Tech. The Hokier Nation embraces our own with open heart and hands to those who offer their hearts and minds. We are strong and brave and innocent and unafraid. We are better than we think, not quite what we want to be. We are alive to the imagination and the possibility we will continue to invent the future through our blood and tears, through all this sadness. We are the Hokies. We will prevail, we will prevail. We are Virginia Tech. "
Wh is Nikki?
Does anyone know what the “Appalachian infant” thing is all about? Very strange, I thought.....
She’s always gotta be shilling for the cause, you know. Nothing takes precedence over the forward march of socialism.
What? Liberals are scum.
Almost the whole speech I didn't get and went waaaaaaaaaaaaay over my head
She is anything but coming together.
Well said. Thats insane.
I guess she thinks he's a 'terrorist.'
When I first heard her, I thought it was a replay of the Wellstone Rally. That is the exact tone she took.
“We know we did not deserve it but neither does”.... the audience here who has to listen to this baloney !!!
She’s a real piece of work..
She disgraced the dedication of a monument in Cincinnati last year. She is a hater.
I am not a son of a bitch like Kenny Blackwell …
http://axinar.blogspot.com/2006/10/i-am-cincinnati-by-nikki-giovanni.html
nice turn of phrase there.
Is anyone really surprised? After the Wellstone memorial, The Coretta scott King funeral that a leftist would use a grand stage like this to spew this absolute tripe. Especially in Academia.
Does every University have an on staff Poet Laurette?
The students I saw at the student gathering today seem pretty conservative and well spoken when interviewed by the MSM.
Nikki seemed to take advantage of the situation to grand stand for causes beyond the horrific events that took place yesterday at VT.
How long is the VT circus in town anyway? I’m sure that there are at least 1,343 people who haven’t been interviewd or photo’d on tv yet..........
I would like to know just who likes this woman enough to invite her in the first place.
She's not saying that they're equivalent tragedies, she's saying that there's no reason behind the tragedy at Virginia Tech anymore than there's reason behind tragedies that happen anywhere in the world. Deserve has nothing to do with it, so be sad but don't be afraid.
Not her best by any stretch of the imagination, but I give Prof. Giovanni slack because she is writing one day after the incident.
Speaking of which, Nikki Giovanni is quite a talented poet and worth looking at for any FReeper poetry fans.
Obviously a swipe at Appalachian mining, because, you know, infants are routinely killed in their cribs by boulders rolling over their houses that were in turn dislodged by mining companies. Republican mining companies, of course.
she’s a real piece of work
When you mine for coal in West Virginia (where she is most likely referring to), you can destabilize the ground and cause settling of the soil which can be a hazzard to buildings. Not exactly on the same level a threat as, say, global warming. Or killer asteroids. Or Duke Lacrosse players. Or Karl Rove (insert scary music here....).
But you are completely right to thing this is very strange. This woman is obviously a committed leftist and decided to hijack this ceremony to air her grievances about all kinds of crap nobody at VT has any input, control or ability to remedy.
Exactly. The rally cheer at the end seemed inappropriate for a solemn occasion a little more than 24 hours after the massacre.
Yes, indeed. We Republicans love to kill babies in their cribs.
OH, no.....WAIT. It's liberals who want to slaughter them before they're even born......
I was really hoping her speech was going to be good LOL
It just went from bad to worse and it had no heart
she did not even believe her own BS!
Her politically wacko speech was way out of line, but her rallying the students and making them feel 'normal' for a moment served a good purpose.............IMO.
Profound. Let me think about it for a minute. Ok, I’m done.
Talk about destabilization! He's the king!
I don’t know who she is, but I loved her short, nappy blond hair.
” She disgraced the dedication of a monument in Cincinnati last year. She is a hater “
She was happy that Tiger lost the Masters and called him “that little Negro.”
She has called President Bush a mass murderer and war criminal.
Imbecilic.
NIKKI GIOVANNI was born in Knoxville, Tennessee, and grew up in Lincoln Heights, an all-black suburb of Cincinnati, Ohio. She and her sister spent their summers with their grandparents in Knoxville, and she graduated with honors from Fisk University, her grandfather’s alma mater, in 1968; after graduating from Fisk, she attended the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University. She published her first book of poetry, Black Feeling Black Talk, in 1968, and within the next year published a second book, thus launching her career as a writer. Early in her career she was dubbed the “Princess of Black Poetry,” and over the course of more than three decades of publishing and lecturing she has come to be called both a “National Treasure” and, most recently, one of Oprah Winfrey’s twenty-five “Living Legends.”
Many of Giovanni’s books have received honors and awards. Her autobiography, Gemini, was a finalist for the National Book Award; Love Poems, Blues: For All the Changes, and Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea were all honored with NAACP Image Awards. Blues: For All the Changes reached #4 on the Los Angeles Times Bestseller list, a rare achievement for a book of poems. Most recently, her children’s picture book Rosa, about the civil rights legend Rosa Parks, became a Caldecott Honors Book, and Bryan Collier, the illustrator, was given the Coretta Scott King award for best illustration. Rosa also reached #3 on The New York Times Bestseller list.
Giovanni’s honors and awards have been steady and plentiful throughout her career. The recipient of some twenty-five honorary degrees, she has been named Woman of the Year by Mademoiselle Magazine, The Ladies Home Journal, and Ebony Magazine. She was tapped for the Ohio Women’s Hall of Fame and named an Outstanding Woman of Tennessee. Giovanni has also received Governor’s Awards from both Tennessee and Virginia. She was the first recipient of the Rosa L. Parks Woman of Courage Award, and she has also been awarded the Langston Hughes Medal for poetry. She is an honorary member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority and has received Life Membership and Scroll from The National Council of Negro Women. A member of PEN, she was honored for her life and career by The History Makers. She has received the keys to more than two dozen cities. A scientist who admires her work even named a new species of bat he discovered for her!
The author of some 30 books for both adults and children, Nikki Giovanni is a University Distinguished Professor at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia.
A female caller called in to Savage’s show tonight and mentioned that remark against Blackwell.
Now, now. This is "art".
Perhaps... but it could have waited a few days.
LOL...it not only went waaaaaaaay over my head...but when she ran back on the stage for an encore ovation...I was really disgusted.
I think the kids responded to the 'cheer' for VT more than the message she was trying to give through her little poem. But what do I know (shrug)
:)
...the Appalachian infant in the killed in the middle of the night in his crib in the home his father built with his own hands being run over by a boulder because the land was destabilized...
So...this has been happening a lot lately?
“Look here, steward, if this is coffee, I want tea; but if this is tea, then I wish for coffee.”— Punch caption, 1902.
Add sadness to even more sadness.
I initially posted this on another thread, but it seems much better placed here.
Nikki Giovanni is a token writer and an insignificant poet; her work is only considered important because it is endlessly and myopically preoccupied with race and the hagiography of civil rights figures. Langston Hughes was fine poet, Jean Toomer wrote a first-rate novel, and Derek Walcott matters, but Ms Giovanni is an intellectual waterfly. There are plenty of third-rate writers and dreary poets like bell hooks and Maya Angelou who also have armloads of awards and a standing invite to go on Oprah; it doesn’t matter, they are still awful.
The audience warmly embraced her because they don’t know any better; they are cowed into thinking she is deep because someone always trots out the litany of awards that are supposed to stand in for her obvious lack of talent. They are also held in the spell of white guilt and it occludes both their discernment and their taste. No thoughtful writer, at her age, would ever say something like this in public, ever:
“We do not understand this tragedy We know we did nothing to deserve it But neither does a child in Africa dying of AIDS Neither do the invisible children walking the night away To avoid being captured by a rogue army Neither does the baby elephant watching his community being devastated for ivory Neither does the Mexican child looking for fresh water Neither does the Appalachian infant killed in the middle of the night In his crib in the home his father built with his own hands Being run over by a boulder because the land was destabilized No one deserves a tragedy”
It makes me wince just to read it. It is rubbish on so many different levels I don’t even know where to begin. Whatever their politics, no poet could utter such silly and sanctimonious drivel on such an occasion.
Incidentally, the sullen lunatic who murdered all these people was not college material; his writing is so appallingly bad that he should never have made it through any year in college, anywhere in the country, at any time in American history. But he was obviously passed along for years without the slightest hint of any talent whatsoever; no one gave him the rightful F he deserved because there are obviously no standards left. The same English department at VT that idolizes a phony like Ms. Giovanni was the same department who allowed the author of “Richard McBeef” to get as far as senior year. Sigh
This woman is a race baiter and hate monger (typical liberal)
Last year Fountain Square here in Cincinnati was reopened after a major renovation. A big event was scheduled meant to bring the entire city together to celebrate. Granted, this city has had some major race issues since the 2001 riots but the city has come a long way in resolving some issues and moving forward.
So on comes this shriveled up old hack who spews her venom to the point of calling the honorable Ken Blackwell an SOB, she re-opened the wounds of the 2001 riots by invoking police brutality. She openly professed what a good man our current do-nothing (and horrible baseball pitcher) mayor Mark Mallory who claims our city is safe, yet he walks around with a tax payer funded bodyguard.
http://frontier.cincinnati.com/blogs/gov/2006/10/poet-giovanni-calls-blackwell-sob-at_14.asp
full text here:
http://www.plunderbund.com/?p=1089
EXCELLENT editorial here:
http://www.ccn-usa.net/contents.php?typeid=5&id=365
the scums at Democratic Underground love her:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x2397517
Its race baiters and liberal malcontents like this so called “poet” who are the reason that we will NEVER normalize race relations in this country. Without their victims, people like Giovanni, Sharpton and Jackson are out of business.
Nonsense. The various "tragedies" that she mentions here seem to be mostly cases where greedy capitalist interests undermined human (or animal) welfare. Giovanni specializes in grievances over those things. I have no idea how they are supposed to compare with what happened at VT, unless (as I suspect) her point is that more gun control would have saved the day.
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She no look Italian.
"The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.
For let Philosopher and Doctor preach Of what they will, and what they will not - each Is but one Link in an eternal Chain That none can slip, nor break, nor over - reach.
And that inverted Bowl we call The Sky, Whereunder crawling coop'd we live and die, Lift not your hands to It for help - for It As impotently rolls as you or I.
With Earth's first Clay They did the Last Man knead, And there of the Last Harvest sow'd the Seed: And the first Morning of Creation wrote What the Last Dawn of Reckoning shall read.
Yesterday This Day's Madness did prepare; Tomorrow's Silence, Triumph, or Despair: Drink! for you know not whence you came, nor why: Drink! for you know not why you go, nor where.
I don't think they were responding to her stupid poem...........but what do I know? :)
I somehow think the overly multiculturist attitude at VT may have discouraged his suite mates from reporting “the weird Asian dude”... even though some of the faculty were already aware of him.
Perhaps. But the kids did it today. I think they needed it now.
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