Sandburg, a poet who sees the humor as well as the tragedy in life, breaks out into a characteristically hearty laugh during a visit toSmith's rural home-
come back to see what progress we are making on
the painting. "I like it, Bill. It has some of the
chaos that is in everything you do!"
Sandburg likes to get out his guitar and sing
to his own accompaniment. He uses the chords of
the folk guitarist but admires the classic guitar.
He once told Andres Segovia that if he had a
choice of whom he would be in his next incarna
tion, he would like to be Segovia. The world's
greatest guitarist, esteeming Sandburg highly,
countered by saying that he would have all the
better of it if he, Segovia, could be reincarnated
as Sandburg.
What Carl will do or say is seldom predictable,
but almost invariably there is a Tightness and
nobility to his reactions. After one of his lecture
recitals at a college, one of the students intro
duced herself with some pride as an "actress."
Carl acknowledged her, turned to another young
woman standing more modestly to the side and
asked, "And who are you?" Shyly she answered,
"Oh, Mr. Sandburg, I'm just a nobody." Carl
patted her arm and said, "Well, I am your
brother."
His mind ranges widely, examining the chaff
and the kernel of the rare and the commonplace.
"Have you ever noticed how many words have a
meaning inappropriate to their sound? Glaucoma,
for example. If you didn't know its meaning you
would think it a beautiful word . . . perhaps the
name of a lake or a village in Ireland."
His lovely wife, Lillian Steichen Sandburg, is
skilled in animal husbandry and raises champion
goats on their 245-acre Connemara Farm. Carl,
deadpan, comments: "I drink goats' milk because
it makes small curds in the stomach. The effect of
the goats' milk curds rubbing against the ulcers
is much more gentle than the larger curds of
cows' milk!"
Sandiiurg Is A man capable of great anger and
sarcasm. He is intransigent and outspoken in
the defense of individual rights and human dig
nity. He scorns the safety of silence. Many articu
late persons who disagreed with the actions of the
late Sen. Joseph McCarthy chose not to protest.
But Sandburg's voice was heard.
Sandburg has always been something of a radi
cal, and proud of it; a radical in the same sense
that Lincoln was a radical.
He is fiercely loyal to his friends. John Stein
beck is one for whom he has high regard. Sand
burg has never forgiven the critic Alfred Kazin
for what Carl considers to have been an unfair
attack on one of Steinbeck's books. Asked to a
reception at Kazin's home to honor some visiting
foreign literary figures who had expressed a de
sire to meet him, Carl declined, preferring in
stead to call on the visitors alone at their hotel.
He is piqued that the American Academy of
(Continued on pope 7)
Smith's it-year-old daughter Kim sits fascinated
irhile Sandburg tells her a story. When she was
a baby, she took her first steps into his arms.
Family Wtekly, January 1, 1MJ
J