Read more about Dr. Madison’s career in the Kennebec Journal: “UMaine’s new distance-learning chief knows remote”. Column by David Offer.

JGR: Curt, are there different levels of commitment in working together? That’s one of the dimensions my long-term collaborator Stephanie Farrow and I have been discussing in our blog posts here on Riehlife and for our Creative Catalyst column on Telling Her Stories.

5.1 Collaboration: How to Make It Work
5.2 Collaboration: Trust Floats the Boat
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CM: Yes. I’d like to call these levels of commitment as degrees of intellectual bandwidth. You can only commit based on your capacity

JGR: And…?

CM: One way of easing the illustration of capacity to collaborate is to make categories along what actually is a continuous scale. How about Cooperative, Collaborative, and Concerted for categories?

Cooperative effort means not getting in each other’s way. We could have different goals but with intersecting means of achieving them.

JGR: It could also include bringing something to the table.

CM: Yes. That would be a reason to cooperate. Then the next level would be Collaborative effort that means mutually helping each other reach their goals. Now it matters to want the other person’s goal to succeed.

JGR: Isn’t a common goal shared?

CM: I’d leave that for Concerted Effort. Here is an example to explain the different levels
Let’s say bunch of artists make work. They agree to not disparage each other unnecessarily and to accept that art is different things to different people. They are being cooperative.

Now this group of artists decides that they have a common goal of wanting to display their work. Some want to sell. Some want to gain fame. Some just like to be with their friends. They decide to make an exhibit so they pick a date and place and all show up. Great. They have cooperated yet they have different goals.

What if we escalated that to a concerted effort? Now they need to decide on a common goal. Some part of the group wants to sell their work. They need to have rules of how to use joint efforts to gain a common goal. They might need to discuss how to store work, bill for a rented space, decide who gets to be by the door and who has to set up in the back by the bathroom. And on. It begins to get complicated.

As we move from Cooperative to Concerted we escalate the degree of commitment. We get a different set of costs and rewards. It is important to realize that there are levels of benefits and costs. Not every thought of working together means first defining the most difficult item–a shared goal.

These three levels are often confounded. And we can decide in advance how to build capacity for commitment to the level of shared effort we want. We can both measure and create the capacity to work together. We can look at organizations which have greater or lesser capacities to reach concerted action. That is, they have a greater or lesser bandwidth to carry their intellectual resources.
The larger bandwidth, the easier it is to escalate to concerted action if necessary.

JGR: Hmm…yes, my most successful and most fun collaborations (or concerted action) were marked an emotional bandwidth that has to be present for each person to bring their best forward to make something new and better.

In these partnerships there’s a shared culture in how we work together. There’s a capacity to be relational—to give and take. To be generous. I can only count five people I had this kind of work relationship with.

Are you saying that we can pull apart these nuances of emotion and culture to describe the capacity to work together?

CM: Yes, having the more channels we have to redress slights and respond to nuances supports the capacity for concerted action. The structure of an organization, and the culture that supports putting resources into sharing work, makes up the intellectual bandwidth.

JGR: Curt, this opens up some different ways of thinking about levels of commitment in working together and how we can talk about it. Thanks for being my guest on Riehlife as part of my Blog-of-the –Month theme on collaboration.
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Curt Madison’s Bio

Curt Madison came to Alaska in 1971 direct from an undergraduate psychology degree at Stanford University. In Alaska, Curt has worked as a riverboat pilot, filmmaker, and biographer collaborating on 22 biographies of elders in rural Alaska with Yvonne Yarber. He has a MA in Political Science from University of Hawaii-Manoa (1976) which included thesis research in Samoa and a PhD from the University of Arizona (1999) in Communication. Dr. Madison flies a two-seat antique airplane on cross country trips whenever his heart needs restarting. He currently is the Director of eLearning Program Development at the School of Management, University of Alaska Fairbanks.

Curt Madison is a buddy from High School. This fact is distinctive in that he is the only person I continue to be in touch with from any of my schooling—either high school or colleges. We reconnected at the Alton [Senior] High School class of 1967 40th reunion. Over a malt Curt told me that what I call Jazz Conversations are known more formally as appreciative inquiry. The conversations here are like that. You can read his fascinating bio at the end of each conversation.

Does Competition Drive Collaboration? In Conversation with Curt Madison

CM: The greatest motivator for collaboration is competition. To collaborate you want to have competition.

JGR: That makes no sense to me. Explain.

CM: Why would you want to collaborate in the first place? To be better, right? Collaboration adds a layer of overhead beyond just doing something yourself. Collaboration requires communication with all its pitfalls.

JGR: And, to have more fun.

CM: Well, if we are talking about entertainment, then sure, it is more fun to do something with a friend than to do it alone. But if we take a larger view, remember people in the business world also collaborate. But they do it for a different reason. It has to do with where ideas come from and general efficiency. Let’s contrast competition with monopoly. We can apply it to writing. How do things get published?

JGR: Quality is at play, as is finding a match between market and material. There’s a degree of subjectivity, too, in how work is chosen to be published.

CM: So the writing is at different levels for different markets. Sometimes it is crucial to be absolutely the best—because there is a limiting market. Sometimes it is a matter of being appropriate to the goals of a group. When you write the minutes of a meeting for your own church group, the goal is to get down what is required. When you write a history of churches, the goal is to appeal to an audience that has a choice of what to read.

What if the only thing that kept you from writing more was typing faster? Would having another person typing produce twice the material, thus doubling your chance of being published?

JGR: No. That’s just stenography.

CM: There has to be some standard of what makes the work better. If you want to be published in any venue you have to be better than what could replace your work. Collaboration can make people more successful.

JGR: Hmmm. So you’re saying that without competition there’s no reason to collaborate because you wouldn’t have to be any better than you are? I’m not sure about that.

CM: In a monopoly work is ordered to be done because it’s appropriate. Employees in a monopoly can only stare morosely at the wall wondering if their work coincides with an enforced set of appropriate standards. Dull, or interesting by chance.
A monopoly (and a vacuum) is not natural. A monopoly exists only because it was created to exist. A monopoly serves a predetermined need – usually as long as it can hold on. Competition, on the other hand, is a way to constantly re-investigate fit and efficiency.

JGR: So, you’re saying that competition opens possibility?

CM: Yes. There’s a search for what hasn’t been thought of so new ideas and elements come in.

JGR: What about famous inventors? Aren’t they driven by the hunt for truth or new territory? Isn’t there an intrinsic value? Isn’t it fun to invent?

CM: Sure it is fun to invent. But look at the story of inventions. How many times have you read a story about a person who produced a great invention and then was cheated out of the rewards of wealth and fame? Why is that even a story if the goal is purely intrinsic?

JGR: Well, yeah. They have to eat.

CM: If there were a better method of coming up with new ideas and gaining a reward, wouldn’t you choose it? And, here is a question, “What if each person had his or her own agenda for work.” Is that collaboration?

JGR: That’s only half of collaboration.

CM: Clearly we are getting to a more nuanced sense of collaboration. Now we have half collaboration. OK, let’s say Ford is trying to make money selling cars. They hire a Chinese company to make tires. The Chinese engineers design tires for SUVs. But to make the tires cheaper, the Chinese company does not employ a marketing department. They like to sell to one company without overhead. Has the tire company been hired by Ford to make tires? Or has the tire company hired Ford to market their tires. Linking the two enterprises results in mutual efficiencies.

JGR: But, that still doesn’t fit my definition of collaboration. There are still two separate agendas.

CM: OK. Here’s another shot at the nuance. Let’s say two people are car designers. Each one has only $50. They both need software that costs $100 available at www.AnyCarDesign.com [fantasy site].One person wants to design a Hummer, and the other wants to design a motorcycle. The same software can do both.

They go out for coffee even though they don’t particularly like to talk. They find that they both share the goal of getting the means of production. And they find that they both have the same problem designing a universal joint. So they pool their money, buy the software, and design a joint. They “collaborate” to complete their vehicles.

Together they found a solution to overcome an obstacle. They created a single thing. They collaborated on a means to the end. But their end goals of designing a Hummer and a motorcycle are vastly different.

But wait there is more. Why not just call MIT? Surely there is an engineer there who could design a joint for them. They don’t because they don’t have money. They could give up on doing it, or put heads together and do it themselves. If they don’t do it together, they have to drop out of competition.

They either retreat from competition or stay in the game. They have to collaborate to become more competitive.

JGR: What if there isn’t any competition?

CM: Back to our contrast of competition versus monopoly. In a monopoly our heroes only work on problems deemed important enough to be solved by the appropriateness functions of the monopoly. This state of affairs prevents disruptive innovations, the messiness, and the oily, slippery enjoyment of life. If there’s no competition, the organization loses one of major motivators for collaboration. It is possible to look at collaboration as a strategy to be employed with its costs and rewards.

JGR: I don’t’ like your argument. Collaboration is something creative happening that people are doing together. You’re talking at a systemic and organizational level. I believe that within the collaborative unit that competition is destructive.

CM: Let’s talk some more about when collaboration is fun and when it is a pain in the ass. The next topic could be intellectual bandwidth.

Part 2 of our conversation discusses degrees of capacity for working together (cooperation, collaboration, and concerted effort).

You might also read our Creative Catalyst column written by Stephanie Farrow and myself. Here are the first two posts of a three-part cycle for Telling Her Stories, the Story Circle Network blog.

5.1 Collaboration: How to Make It Work
5.2 Collaboration: Trust Floats the Boat
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Curt Madison’s Bio

Curt Madison came to Alaska in 1971 direct from an undergraduate psychology degree at Stanford University. In Alaska, Curt has worked as a riverboat pilot, filmmaker, and biographer collaborating on 22 biographies of elders in rural Alaska with Yvonne Yarber. He has a MA in Political Science from University of Hawaii-Manoa (1976) which included thesis research in Samoa and a PhD from the University of Arizona (1999) in Communication. Dr. Madison flies a two-seat antique airplane on cross country trips whenever his heart needs restarting. He currently is the Director of eLearning Program Development at the School of Management, University of Alaska Fairbanks.

“What is a Blog Chain?” Yvonne says, A blog chain involves about a dozen people who have a blog and want to participate in a fun group activity. Each participant visits the blog of every person on the chain within one week of being sent the list of URLs. When visiting each blog, participants read and comment on one post they find interesting. When you leave a comment on the other eleven blogs you will in turn receive eleven comments on your own blog. And, the search engines smile upon you because this kind of activity increases your blog’s popularity and raises its ranks in search engines.

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Who’s Blogging?

Here are our blogging friends who form the chain. Again, from Yvonne:

If you’d like to play with us and get in some great reading this week, simply visit each blog and leave a comment along with the URL to your own blog. You may also want to follow these people on Twitter.

Allison Maslan’s blog is about self-empowerment in body mind and spirit. Learn how to make the changes you want in business, career, relationships, and your body when you visit http://www.myblastoff.com/blog. Be sure to follow Allison on Twitter: @AllisonMaslan

After much debate about which of my blogs to feature in this blog chain, I’ve decided to introduce you to my book, More Than Meets the Eye. Learn about the process of death and dying, find green burial info, consider activity in the afterlife, and talk about spirit communication at http://deathdyingafterlife.blogspot.com/. You’ll recognize my constant tweeting as @writersinthesky.

On Writer’s Journey is a blog owned by Penny Lockwood Ehrenkranz. Visit her at http://pennylockwoodehrenkranz.blogspot.com/ to read author interviews, book reviews, and all things writing related. She is so generous that she reviewed two of my books and interviewed me twice! Penny is @pennyehrenkranz on Twitter.

Carolyn Howard-Johnson is a long-time networking friend of mine. She and I have done multiple joint venture projects like this blog chain. She has several blogs, but we have chosen http://warpeacetolerance.blogspot.com/ to honor our soldiers during this blog chain. Carolyn is on Twitter as @frugalbookpromo.

After 15 years of working in the industry as an ASE-certified automobile technician, my son, Robert “Zeb” McCurley, has started his own Nashville business, Wheel Fix It Mobile Vehicle Maintenance and Repair. His rates are much lower than the cost of taking a car to the shop; plus, he comes to your location! Find auto care tips and information about how to contact him for a local repair when you visit his blog at http://wheelfixit.blogspot.com/. Follow @WheelFixItNow on Twitter.

Tisha Morris is a new WITS client and I am thrilled to be helping her promote her new book, 27 Things to FengShui Your Home. Her blog http://www.mindbodyom.com/ has some great tips for declutter your life, home, and workspace. I’ve been cleaning like a fiend ever since I got hold of her book! She’s on Twitter as @mindbodyom.

If you are looking for something to do outdoors or some new place to go for vacation, you’ll love Loretta Leda’s blog http://www.newoutdooradventures.blogspot.com. Follow her on Twitter: @FloridaSpaGirls.

Schall Adams is a new girlfriend and networking partner I found when working on Allison Maslan’s Amazon book launch. Schall’s blog is all about women empowering women to live Happy Successful Passionate lives! http://www.mygirlfriendmentors.com/blog

Another WITS client, networker, and dear friend has joined this blog chain. Janet Riehl and I were virtual friends for years before we met in person when she came to Nashville for a recording session with my son-in-law, Scott Kidd. When you visit her blog, http://www.riehlife.com, you may read about the audio book they created! You’ll want to follow Janet on Twitter as @Riehlife.

http://bethtrissel.blogspot.com/ Historical and Light Paranormal Romance Author. Gardening with a focus on herbs, heirloom plants and old Southern recipes. Please follow Beth on Twitter: @BethTrissel.

Denise DeMaras is a women’s health coach, artist, and writer whose medicine is change. She helps women process emotions, reduce stress, and increase creativity, to make changes or cope with them. She is a board-certified nutrition consultant, Chopra Certified Meditation Instructor, Chapman University Certified Art for Healing Instructor, Columbia University Certified Holistic Health Counselor. I love her fabulous blog at http://blog.denisedemaras.com/ ! Follow Denise on Twitter: @ddemaras.

http://folkheartpressblog.blogspot.com/ is about folklore and family stories, mythology and more. Follow Folkheart Press on Twitter: @Folkheartpress.

http://iwritesome.blogspot.com/ features the musings of Dennis S Martin; poet, playwright and novelist from Baltimore, Maryland. Follow Dennis on Twitter: @dsmartin49.

http://leedesign2.blogspot.com/ Tips on Mac computers and graphic design. Follow Jessica Galbraith on Twitter: @leedesign.

http://nancykellyallen.blogspot.com/ This blog is all about writing tips for writers and teachers of writing. Each week I will address one aspect of writing. Occasionally, I will post tips about no-fee contests and calls for submissions by publishers. Follow Nancy Allen on Twitter: @NancyKellyAllen.

The book publicist Scott Lorenz is president of Westwind Communications, a public republic relations and marketing firm with a special knack for working with authors and entrepreneurs to help them get all the publicity they deserve and more. Scott is a regular contributor to WITS Newsletter. http://thebookpublicist.blogspot.com/. Follow Scott on Twitter: @aBookPublicist.

Tom is a retired pharmacist and now does dentistry in third-world countries to help less-fortunate children. Read his blog about his adventures at http://tomvancel.blogspot.com/ .

Long-time WITS client Linda Ballou is about to introduce another book. Find out more about her first book, Wai-nani, High Chiefess of Hawaii-Her Epic Journey, when you visit her blog: http://wwwlindaballouauthor.blogspot.com/. Follow Linda on Twitter: @LindaBallou.

Happy networking, everyone. Let me know how it goes.

Yvonne Perry,
Writers in the Sky Creative Writing Services

http://writersinthesky.com

* “The Little School.” by Argentinian writer Alicia Partnoy.
* “The Colour of the Moon” by the Greek author Alkouni Papadaki.
* “Once in a Promised Land’ by Jordanian author Laila Halaby.
* “A Handbook to Luck,” by Cuban author Cristina Garcia.
* Catalina de Erasuo, Memoir of a Basque Lieutenant Nun: Transvestite in the New World (1626-30, Spain), true story.
* “The Bone People,” by Keri Hulme, a Maori writer from New Zealand.

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International Women’s Day (8 March) is a global day celebrating the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future. In some places like China, Russia, Vietnam and Bulgaria, IWD is a national holiday. The first IWD was run in 1911. Next year is IWD Global Centenary 1911-201. [From International Women's Day site.]

In our column “Creative Catalyst” on Story Circle Network’s blog Telling Her Stories: The Broad View, we have posted the first two of a three-part cycle on collaboration:

5.1 Collaboration: How to Make It Work
5.2 Collaboration: Trust Floats the Boat

What makes a good collaboration?

Janet: In part one we talked about how we met and began our collaboration that drew on:

1) Shared life and work experiences that formed a personal and professional bond between us;
2) Knowing and liking each other. Work as an extension of friendship and the other way around.
3) Interlocking Strengths & Skills

What else has worked for us?

#4 The same only different: Balance

Stephanie: We’re good partners. In addition to the complementary set of skills we bring to the work, we have different personalities and ways of working. That somehow balances out what we bring to our work together.

You’re more directive than I am. You jump right in to shape a situation where I tend to work around whatever is going on. You’re more “out there” while I’m more reserved. You’re the frog, leaping into the water with abandon. I’m the one on the shore delicately dipping in a toe before making the decision to enter or not. We both see the whole picture, yet enjoy analyzing. I like to take a problem or piece of writing apart and make it work better as a whole. Imprecision irritates me.

#5 A shared sense of purpose, work ethic, discipline, humor, and desire for quality work.

Janet: It was sad really…when Stephanie became irritated by my imprecision.

Stephanie: Yes! This phrase of ours has helped us gain perspective and laughter over the years. Because of our time together, we can use verbal shorthand—no explanation necessary—because we have a history

Janet: It’s like a long-married couple who speak in code. Now that is really sad!
Carol Lloyd categorizes several different types of creativity. What I like about our collaborative relationship is that we not only have differences, but also over-lapping strengths.
We both are good at brainstorming and get a kick out of it, but that’s probably the phase of the creative process that’s my best shot. Carol calls that generative creativity.

While I’m analytical, you are even more so. We can both shape and structure, but you are clearer, pared down, and rigorous in what to leave out and when to push for clarification. In Carol’s term, I see you as a “realizer.” You move our work into form and hold it to a high standard. On my own I tend to be rather a seat of the pants gal and improvise as I go along.

#6 Knowing and Honoring Needs

Stephanie: “Rigorous”—I like that word. One of the reasons we can work together so intensely is that our communication is mainly by phone and email. This lessens the intensity so it’s not so overwhelming. That has made it possible to meet for longer periods of time—and sustain our working relationship over time.

We both find face-to-face interactions tiring. We’re good about honoring that. When we’re together for more than just a quick visit, we build in alone time to have a cup of tea, relax and rest. The sensitivity of good friendship.

Janet: You are more inward that I am, but we both need that rest to recover and regroup. We share many of the INFP [Meyers-Briggs Introverted-Intuitive-Feeling-Perceiving], and those qualities and patterns helped us tune in more accurately and with greater understanding. Since the INFP profile is only 1 percent of the population, we’re lucky to have found that in a working partner.

Stephanie: Only 1%. We are rara avis indeed!

Janet: The underlying qualities in our relationship that melds our collaboration are a shared sense of purpose, humor, desire for quality work, a shared work ethic and discipline. We’ve both done extensive work for hire which requires working to client specifications, on deadline and within budget. These common values yield good communication, expectations, and trust.

#7 Truth, Trust, and Resolving Conflict

Let’s talk about trust a bit. What is the nature of trust? How is it built? How does it feed into collaboration? How is it sustained?

Stephanie: True trust can come only through experience. Unless you’ve done things together, how do you know if you can count on someone? The more you interact the more comfortable you’re able to feel.
Trust also involves being able to be truthful without feeling as if you’re putting yourself in danger of being knocked down. Nothing worthwhile ever proceeds with some sort of snag, so it’s critical to be able to talk about the snags and figure out what to do about them.
Without trust true collaboration isn’t possible. If you’re holding back because of unease, then it isn’t collaboration. It becomes a hierarchical work situation in which one holds power over the other. Trustworthiness itself sustains trust. Being trustworthy means doing what you’ve promised, respecting your partner, and resolving differences when they do arise.

Janet: Yup. Yup. Resolving conflict—either through exploring it directly or just laughing about it—is vital. And, yes, for us being willing to stick with it has allowed trust. I feel secure because I believe this is a friendship that will go the distance rather than crumple at the first wrinkle. Perhaps for others that security and depth can come through shorter acquaintanceship, but it’s the longevity that seals it.

Stephanie: Yes, stick-to-it-tiv-ness.

Janet: Yup.

www.riehlife.com/2010/01/30/making-collaboration-work-part-1-with-womens-memoir-duo-kendra-bonnett-matilda-butler

www.riehlife.com/2010/01/30/making-collaboration-work-part-2-womens-memoir-duo-kendra-bonnett-matilda-butler/

storycircle.typepad.com/scn/2010/01/collaboration.html

In our first 2-part interview Kendra Bonnett and Matilda Butler told us how they met and shared five tips for successful collaboration.

How Stephanie & I met and began our collaboration

Today we offer the first of a second two-part interview on collaboration between Stephanie Farrow and myself. It’s a working relationship within the context of a long friendship that’s been going on for 37 years, longer than many marriages.

Stephanie and I have collaborated on many writing and training projects. Most recently we’ve joined up to write our Creative Catalyst column for Telling Her Stories, the Story Circle Network blog.
In our column from February-March-April we’re running a 3-post Creative Catalyst cycle.

5.1 Collaboration: How to Make It Work
5.2 Collaboration: Trust Floats the Boat

Stephanie lives in New Mexico while I live in St. Louis. We haven’t seen each other for four years. Our collaboration takes place via phone and email.

For this interview we experimented chatting by Gmail. Our phone time tends toward delightful jazz conversations as we branch out discursively and then pull it back in to a point. We found we enjoyed the Gmail technology to capture conversation. It allowed time for on-the-spot reflection.

We first met in Ghana in 1973 when we were both teaching in Peace Corps. She lived in the South while I lived in the North. When I traveled to Kumasi during school breaks, we’d spend time visiting over tea. Those conversations began building the foundation of our collaboration back in the United States in New Mexico, and then continued when I moved to California and then to Missouri.

#1 Shared experience to build upon.

Janet: Stephanie, I remember sitting in your house outside Kumasi visiting and sipping tea as we first got to know each other. It seems to me that beginning started building the foundation of our collaboration.
Stephanie: I remember first meeting you when we got in country the first day. You and your husband came to our room and we lounged on the beds. Everything seemed so new—Africa, that is—and here you were—old Africa hands with experience in Botswana.
Janet: With your perspective of coming from Honduras and Guatemala, you and your husband John quickly became old hands yourselves. You spoke flawless French and Spanish. Coming from Botswana we knew Setswana. Those two perspectives gave us a point to start our long conversation of 37 years.

Stephanie: You’re right, in some ways Ghana didn’t seem strange at all—it was just different—another 3rd World country. I think that previous experience made it easier for me to adjust and feel at home straight away.

When you share an overseas experience of any sort—even just going to France to visit the Eiffel Tower or whatever—it changes your perspective on the world. Others who’ve been outside the country understand what this means in a way others can’t.

#2 Knowing and liking each other. Work as an extension of friendship and the other way around.

Stephanie: I can hear your typing over the speaker phone. It sounds like there’s a demented mouse gnawing away.

Janet: Gnaw, Gnaw! We were so fortunate to meet up again in New Mexico in 1979 when we’d both been back in the States a short time going through cultural transition and getting settled in the United States. That reconnection became one of the most important shaping influences of my life. For one, it gave me one of the longest-term friends I’ve ever had in my life.

Stephanie: It’s rare these days to have such a long-term friend. Connections seem much more tenuous these days. We’re such a mobile society that it’s hard to stay connected—especially those of us who don’t even stay in the country!

#3 Interlocking Strengths & Skills

Janet: In the 1980s in New Mexico working together emerged organically from our friendship and similar work interests.
You worked with a variety of nonprofit volunteer organizations—like Amigos de las Americas, Parentcraft, Partners of the Americas, and Coalition for Children. Mostly your work then centered on children and overseas, cross-cultural issues. I worked with community education and later in my consulting firm Clear Communication.

The underlying skills for us both were training and development and communication. With this bond in place we began designing and giving workshops together.

During our three years in the Kellogg Leadership Fellowship for Partners of the Americas that our relationship became closer and we collaborated more frequently as we traveled to Latin America and the Caribbean experiencing places and development issues first hand. I’d never participated in seminars like that before—or met socially with high-level officials.
Stephanie: I hadn’t experienced that before either, so our bond grew. The work we’ve done together since then sprung from that time. The joint understanding we have of the world and of each other informs our work today.

In the second part of our interview we’ll continue our discussion on how to make collaboration work.

Here’s how Robin’s review begins:

Based on Robert Kaplow’s novel of the same name, “Me and Orson Welles” is a coming of age story unfolding during the course of one week in 1937.

What could be better? A drama about the creative process–crashes & crescendos–set in that fascinating decade the 1930s. I’ll see you there!

The Academy of American Poets revealed the National Poetry Month poster for 2010 by award-winning illustrator and graphic designer Marian Bantjes, who recently created several campaigns for Saks Fifth Avenue. Bantjes’s intricate design features kaleidoscopic figures turning beneath a star-filled sky—a scene inspired by the poetry of Wallace Stevens. Lines from the poem “Final Soliloquy of the Interior Paramour” curve across the poster: “We make a dwelling in the evening air, / In which being there together is enough.”

Download and print a copy of the poster now or request one for your school, bookstore, library, or community center. March 1st is the deadline to request a free copy of this year’s poster and receive it in time for April.