"Lowell and Bishop more or less adopt the younger poet Frank Bidart, who catered to Lowell during his endless revisions..and proved Johnny-on-the-spot after Bishop moved to Boston. If at times the poets treated him as a mere factotum, Bidart served as the surrogate son they could gossip about and fuss over."
It's a little difficult to imagine - I'm trying to picture Lowell pinching Frank's cheek - but pretty neat nonetheless.
If memory serves, Frank became the keeper of Bishop's letters and other personal affects after she died. He teaches a class on them sometimes. There are also excerpts from their letters in which one says to the other "Thank you for sending Frank to me. He's awfully peculiar, isn't he?"
ReplyDeleteNicole is right; he did inherit Bishop's library! I took a contemporary American poetry class with him where we read Bishop and Lowell, among others. He did always seem to understate his relationship with them, but it was clear at the time that it was an understatement, given his inheritance.
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