ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Billy Collins - Poet
A two-term U.S. Poet Laureate, Billy Collins captures readers with his understated wit, profound insight -- and a sense of being "hospitable."

Why you should listen

Accessibility is not a word often associated with great poetry. Yet Billy Collins has managed to create a legacy from what he calls being poetically “hospitable.” Preferring lyrical simplicity to abstruse intellectualism, Collins combines humility and depth of perception, undercutting light and digestible topics with dark and at times biting humor.

While Collins approaches his work with a healthy sense of self-deprecation, calling his poems “domestic” and “middle class,” John Taylor has said of Collins: “Rarely has anyone written poems that appear so transparent on the surface yet become so ambiguous, thought-provoking, or simply wise once the reader has peered into the depths.”

In 2001 he was named U.S. Poet Laureate, a title he kept until 2003. Collins lives in Somers, New York, and is an English professor at City University of New York, where he has taught for more than 40 years.

Credits for the animations in this talk:

"Budapest," "Forgetfulness" and "Some Days" -- animation by Julian Grey/Head Gear

"The Country" -- animation by Brady Baltezor/Radium

"The Dead" -- animation by Juan Delcan/Spontaneous

More profile about the speaker
Billy Collins | Speaker | TED.com

TED2014

Billy Collins: Two poems about what dogs think (probably)

比利·科林斯: 兩首小詩探討狗狗的思維（輪廓）

Filmed: 2014-03-20

Readability: 3.1

1,748,151 views

當一條狗望著我們的時候，它在想些什麼？詩人比利·科林斯神遊了兩個截然不同的內心世界。短小精悍，耐人尋味，適合午間小寐時朗誦，然後開始一場奇異的白日夢。

Billy Collins - Poet
A two-term U.S. Poet Laureate, Billy Collins captures readers with his understated wit, profound insight -- and a sense of being "hospitable." Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

00:13

I don't know if you've noticed注意到,

1285

1094

不知各位是否留意到，

00:14

but there's been a spate氾濫 of books圖書

2379

1672