Helen Vendler, A. Kingsley Porter University Professor, Harvard University. This six-part lecture series considers the final works of five modern American poets, as they "take the last look"—reconciling the interface of life and death, without the promise of an afterlife. In this audio podcast of the first lecture, originally delivered at the National Gallery of Art on April 15, 2007, the esteemed poetry critic and professor Helen Vendler frames the binocular styles of modern and premodern poets as they examine life and death "in a single steady gaze." The accompanying publication, Last Looks, Last Books: Stevens, Plath, Lowell, Bishop, Merrill, is available for purchase in the Gallery Shop.