Miroslav Holub -- interview, poems

Frequent readers of this blog probably know that Miroslav Holub is one of my favorite poets.  And it was a great delight to get a recent e-mail message with a link to a previously unpublished 1994 interview with this scientist and poet -- appearing in the April 2 posting in the Virginia Quarterly Review blog.  The interview, conducted and written by Irene Blair Honeycutt, has these opening sentences:     "Miroslav Holub (1923–1998) is one of the most internationally well-known Czech poets. He led a career as a scientist, and his poetry is known for its sharpness and wit, as well as descriptions of aging and suffering." 

Poems starring mathematicians - 4

Each of today's poems is in the voice of a student who looks back.  First, from Carol Dorf, a poem to the author of a book--written as a fan-letter, "Dear Ivar."   And then, for his hero (a special Grammar School teacher) by Czech poet and scientist Miroslav Holub (1923-98), "The Fraction Line."

       Dear Ivar,

       I read your book on the unexpected.

       Like most poets, I opposed mathematics

       when I was young, seeing it as the converse

       to feeling. The previous statement is false.