List of Jewish American poets
Encyclopedia
Persons listed with a double asterisks (**) are winners of the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
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Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
The Pulitzer Prize in Poetry has been presented since 1922 for a distinguished volume of original verse by an American author. However, special citations for poetry were presented in 1918 and 1919.-Winners:...
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- Seth AbramsonSeth AbramsonSeth Abramson is an American poet, attorney, editor, and freelance journalist.-Life:Abramson is a graduate of Dartmouth College, Harvard Law School, and the Iowa Writers' Workshop...
, poet - David Berman, poet, rock musician and cartoonist
- Charles BernsteinCharles BernsteinCharles Bernstein is an American poet, theorist, editor, and literary scholar. Bernstein holds the Donald T. Regan Chair in the Department of English at the University of Pennsylvania. He is one of the most prominent members of the Language poets . In 2006 he was elected a Fellow of the American...
, poet - David BiespielDavid BiespielDavid Biespiel is an American poet who was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, raised in Houston, Texas, and educated at Stanford University, University of Maryland, and Boston University...
, poet - Joseph BrodskyJoseph BrodskyIosif Aleksandrovich Brodsky , was a Russian poet and essayist.In 1964, 23-year-old Brodsky was arrested and charged with the crime of "social parasitism" He was expelled from the Soviet Union in 1972 and settled in America with the help of W. H. Auden and other supporters...
, poet, U.S. Poet Laureate, Nobel Prize (1987) - Richard ChessRichard ChessRichard Chess was born in Los Angeles. He spent most of his childhood and youth in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. He is the author of three books of poetry, Third Temple , Chair in the Desert , and Tekiah...
, poet, professor of Jewish Studies at UNCA - Carl DennisCarl DennisCarl Dennis , an American poet and educator. His book Practical Gods won the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for poetry.-Life and work:...
, poet ** - Alter EsselinAlter EsselinAlter Esselin, was a Russian-born American poet who wrote in the Yiddish language. He was born in Tchernigov, Russia on April 23, 1889 and died in Milwaukee, Wisconsin on November 22, 1974...
, carpenter, poet - Allen GinsbergAllen GinsbergIrwin Allen Ginsberg was an American poet and one of the leading figures of the Beat Generation in the 1950s. He vigorously opposed militarism, materialism and sexual repression...
, beat poet - Louise GlückLouise GlückLouise Elisabeth Glück is an American poet of Hungarian Jewish heritage. She was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 2003, after serving as a Special Bicentennial Consultant three years prior in 2000....
, poet ** - Jorie GrahamJorie GrahamJorie Graham is an American poet. The U.S. Poetry Foundation suggests "She is perhaps the most celebrated poet of the American post-war generation". She replaced poet Seamus Heaney as Boylston Professor at Harvard, becoming the first woman to be appointed to this position...
, poet ** - Allen GrossmanAllen GrossmanAllen Grossman is a noted American poet, critic and professor.-Biography:Born in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1932, Grossman was educated at Harvard University, graduating with an MA in 1956 after several interruptions. He went on to receive a PhD from Brandeis University in 1960, where he remained a...
, poet - Marilyn HackerMarilyn HackerMarilyn Hacker is an American poet, translator and critic. She is Professor of English at the City College of New York....
, poet - Anthony HechtAnthony HechtAnthony Evan Hecht was an American poet. His work combined a deep interest in form with a passionate desire to confront the horrors of 20th century history, with the Second World War, in which he fought, and the Holocaust being recurrent themes in his work.-Early years:Hecht was born in New York...
, poet ** - John HollanderJohn HollanderJohn Hollander is a Jewish-American poet and literary critic. As of 2007, he is Sterling Professor Emeritus of English at Yale University...
, poet, critic - Richard HowardRichard HowardRichard Howard is an American poet, literary critic, essayist, teacher, and translator. He was born in Cleveland, Ohio and is a graduate of Columbia University, where he studied under Mark Van Doren, and where he now teaches...
, poet, translator ** - Chester KallmanChester KallmanChester Simon Kallman was an American poet, librettist, and translator, best known for his collaborations with W. H. Auden and Igor Stravinsky.-Life:...
, poet, librettist - Rodger KamenetzRodger KamenetzRodger Kamenetz is an American poet and author. He was born in Baltimore and educated at Yale, Stanford and Johns Hopkins University...
,poet - Burt KimmelmanBurt KimmelmanBurt Kimmelman is an American poet and scholar.-Life and work:Kimmelman is noted for his astute criticism of modern and postmodern American poetry and the development of the poetics of authorship in medieval Europe and is a celebrated poet within the tradition of William Carlos Williams.Kimmelman...
, poet - Kenneth KochKenneth KochKenneth Koch was an American poet, playwright, and professor, active from the 1950s until his death at age 77...
, poet - Maxine KuminMaxine KuminMaxine Kumin is an American poet and author. She was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1981-1982.-Early years:...
, poet ** - Stanley KunitzStanley KunitzStanley Jasspon Kunitz was an American poet. He was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress twice, first in 1974 and then again in 2000.-Biography:...
, poet ** - Emma LazarusEmma LazarusLazarus began to be more interested in her Jewish ancestry after reading the George Eliot novel, Daniel Deronda, and as she heard of the Russian pogroms in the early 1880s. This led Lazarus to write articles on the subject. She also began translating the works of Jewish poets into English...
, poet - Denise LevertovDenise Levertov-Early life and influences:Levertov was born and grew up in Ilford, Essex.Couzyn, Jeni Contemporary Women Poets. Bloodaxe, p74 Her mother, Beatrice Spooner-Jones Levertoff, came from a small mining village in North Wales...
, poet (born UK) - Philip LevinePhilip Levine (poet)Philip Levine is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American poet best known for his poems about working-class Detroit. He taught for over thirty years at the English Department of California State University, Fresno and held teaching positions at other universities as well...
, poet ** - Samuel MenasheSamuel MenasheSamuel Menashe was an American poet. Born in New York City as Samuel Menashe Weisberg, the son of Russian-Jewish immigrant parents, Menashe grew up in Elmhurst, Queens, and graduated from Townsend Harris High School and Queens College. During World War II he served in the US Army infantry, and in...
, poet - Adah Isaacs MenkenAdah Isaacs MenkenAdah Isaacs Menken was an American actress, painter and poet.-Life and career:There are significant inconsistencies in the various accounts of Menken's early life. In her autobiographical "Some Notes of her life in her own Hand,", Menken claimed she was born Marie Rachel Adelaide de Vere Spenser...
(1835?-1868), actress and poethttp://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/AMenken.html - Richard MichelsonRichard MichelsonRichard Michelson is a poet and a children's book author.In January 2009, As Good As Anybody: Martin Luther King and Abraham Joshua Heschel's Amazing March Toward Freedom, was awarded the Sydney Taylor Book Award Gold Medal from the Association of Jewish Libraries, and A is for Abraham, was...
, Poet, Children’s Book Author. - Howard NemerovHoward NemerovHoward Nemerov was an American poet. He was twice appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 1963 to 1964, and again from 1988 to 1990. He received the National Book Award, Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, and Bollingen Prize for The Collected Poems of Howard Nemerov...
, poet ** - George OppenGeorge OppenGeorge Oppen was an American poet, best known as one of the members of the Objectivist group of poets. He abandoned poetry in the 1930s for political activism, and later moved to Mexico to avoid the attentions of the House Un-American Activities Committee...
, Objectivist poet ** - Alicia OstrikerAlicia OstrikerAlicia Suskin Ostriker is an American poet and scholar who writes Jewish feminist poetry.Alicia is married to the noted astronomer Jeremiah Ostriker who taught at Princeton University...
, poet - Rochelle OwensRochelle OwensRochelle Bass Owens is an American poet and playwright.-Life:She is the daughter of Maxwell and Molly Bass. A native New Yorker, Owens studied at the New School for Social Research and University of Montreal...
, poet - Robert PinskyRobert PinskyRobert Pinsky is an American poet, essayist, literary critic, and translator. From 1997 to 2000, he served as Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress. Pinsky is the author of nineteen books, most of which are collections of his own poetry...
, Poet Laureate of the United States (1997–2000) - Gabriel PreilGabriel PreilGabriel Preil was a modern Hebrew poet active in the United States, who wrote in Hebrew and Yiddish. He was the last of the Haskala poets. The critic Yael Feldman has done significant work on Preil, focusing on the Yiddish influences in his Hebrew poetry...
, Hebrew Poet - Carl RakosiCarl RakosiCarl Rakosi was the last surviving member of the original group of poets who were given the rubric Objectivist. He was still publishing and performing his poetry well into his 90s.-Early life:...
, Objectivist poet - Abraham RegelsonAbraham RegelsonAbraham Regelson was a Hebrew poet, author, children's author, translator, and editor.-Biography:Abraham Regelson was born in Hlusk, now Belarus, in the Russian Empire in 1896, and died at his home in Neveh Monossohn, Israel in 1981...
, poet, translator - Charles ReznikoffCharles ReznikoffCharles Reznikoff was the poet for whom the term Objectivist was first coined. When asked by Harriet Munroe to provide an introduction to what became known as the Objectivist issue of Poetry, Louis Zukofsky provided his essay Sincerity and Objectification: With Special Reference to the Work of...
, Objectivist poet - Adrienne RichAdrienne RichAdrienne Cecile Rich is an American poet, essayist and feminist. She has been called "one of the most widely read and influential poets of the second half of the 20th century."-Early life:...
, poet - Jerome RothenbergJerome RothenbergJerome Rothenberg is an internationally known American poet, translator and anthologist who is noted for his work in ethnopoetics and poetry performance.-Early life and work:...
, poet - Raphael RudnikRaphael RudnikRaphael Rudnik was an American poet and literary scout. He was a graduate of Bard College and Columbia University . He published the poetry collections, A Lesson From the Cyclops , In The Heart or Our City , and Frank, 207...
, poet - Muriel RukeyserMuriel RukeyserMuriel Rukeyser was an American poet and political activist, best known for her poems about equality, feminism, social justice, and Judaism...
, poet - Benjamin SaltmanBenjamin SaltmanBenjamin Saltman was an American poet and Professor of verse writing and contemporary American literature at California State University, Northridge....
, poet - Delmore SchwartzDelmore SchwartzDelmore Schwartz was an American poet and short story writer from Brooklyn, New York.-Biography:Schwartz was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. His parents, Harry and Rose, both Romanian Jews, separated when Schwartz was nine, and their divorce had a profound effect on him. Later, in 1930,...
, poet - Frederick SeidelFrederick Seidel-Career:In 1962, his first book, Final Solutions, was chosen by a jury of Louise Bogan, Stanley Kunitz, and Robert Lowell for an award sponsored by the 92nd Street Y, with a $1,500 prize...
, poet - Karl ShapiroKarl ShapiroKarl Jay Shapiro was an American poet. He was appointed the fifth Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1946.-Biography:...
, poet ** - Carl SolomonCarl SolomonCarl Solomon was an American writer.-Biography:Solomon was born in the Bronx of New York City. His father's death in 1939 had a profoundly negative effect on his early life...
, beat poet - Gertrude SteinGertrude SteinGertrude Stein was an American writer, poet and art collector who spent most of her life in France.-Early life:...
, Modernist poet/writer - Gerald SternGerald SternGerald Stern is an American poet. His work became widely recognized after the 1977 publication of Lucky Life, which was that year's Lamont Poetry Selection, and of a series of essays on writing poetry in American Poetry Review. He has subsequently been given many prestigious awards for his...
, poet - Samuel UllmanSamuel UllmanSamuel Ullman was an American businessman, poet, humanitarian. He is best known today for his poem Youth which was a favorite of General Douglas MacArthur. The poem was on the wall of his office in Tokyo when he became Supreme Allied Commander in Japan...
, poet http://www.alabamamoments.state.al.us/sec31det.html - Louis UntermeyerLouis UntermeyerLouis Untermeyer was an American poet, anthologist, critic, and editor. He was appointed the fourteenth Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1961.-Life and career:...
, poet and anthologist - Louis ZukofskyLouis ZukofskyLouis Zukofsky was an American poet. He was one of the founders and the primary theorist of the Objectivist group of poets and thus an important influence on subsequent generations of poets in America and abroad.-Life:...
, Objectivist poet - Zvi YairZvi YairZvi Yair is the pen-name of the Hebrew poet and Chassidic scholar, Rabbi Zvi Meir Steinmetz . Zvi Yair was a Jewish poet who wrote in Hebrew.-Biography:...
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See also
- Jewish American literatureJewish American literatureJewish American Literature holds an essential place in the literary history of the United States. It encompasses traditions of writing in English, primarily, as well as in other languages, the most important of which has been Yiddish...
- List of Yiddish language poets
- List of Jewish American authors
- List of Jewish American playwrights
- Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States
- Before Columbus FoundationBefore Columbus FoundationThe Before Columbus Foundation is a nonprofit organization founded in 1976 by Ishmael Reed, Victor Hernández Cruz, Shawn Wong and Rudolfo Anaya to be "a multi-ethnic organizing dedicated to promoting a pan-cultural view of America," especially through the promotion of multicultural writers.One of...