Charles Douthat and Robert Frost

Charles Douthat and Robert Frost

From The Beat by Knox County Public Library

August 1, 2025 · 13 min · Season 5 · Episode 4

About this episode

The episode features poet Charles Douthat discussing his work and the life of Robert Frost.

Charles Douthat is a poet, retired litigator, and visual artist. Born and educated in California, he practiced law for many years in New Haven and began writing poems during a long mid-life illness. His first collection, Blue for Oceans, received the PEN New England Award, as the best book of poetry published in 2010 by a New England writer. Concerning Douthat’s newest book, Again, the poet Alan Shapiro writes, “This book is impossible not to love.” Douthat lives in Weston, Connecticut, with his wife, the artist Julie Leff. Robert Frost was born in 1874 in San Francisco. When he was just ten years old, his father died, and Frost’s family moved to Lawrence, Massachusetts to live with his paternal grandparents. Though Frost attended Dartmouth College and Harvard University, he never earned a formal degree. He spent much of his twenties and thirties farming and teaching. In 1912, he moved, with his wife and children, to England where publishers were more receptive to his work. But he moved back to the States in 1915 after the start of the First World War. He lived for the rest of his life mostly in Massachusetts and Vermont. Robert Frost won four Pulitzer Prizes and the…

People in this episode

Guest: Charles Douthat

Topics covered

  • poetry
  • literature
  • biography
  • art
  • writing

Keywords

  • Charles Douthat
  • Robert Frost
  • poetry
  • PEN New England
  • literature
  • biography
  • art

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: PEN New England

Places: California, New Haven, Weston, Connecticut, San Francisco, Lawrence, Massachusetts, England, Massachusetts, Vermont

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