W. D. Snodgrass

W. D. Snodgrass
Born	William De Witt Snodgrass (1926-01-05)5 January 1926 Beaver Falls,Pennsylvania,U.S.
Died	13 January 2009(2009-01-13)(aged 83) Erieville,New York,U.S.
Pen name	W. D. Snodgrass S. S. Gardons
Occupation	Poet,professor
Education	Geneva College University of Iowa(BA,MA,MFA)
Literary movement	Confessional poetry
Notable works	Heart's Needle
Notable awards	Pulitzer PrizeforPoetry(1960)
Spouse	Lila Hank ​ ​ (m.1946;div.1953)​ Janice Ferguson Wilson ​ ​ (m.1954;div.1966)​ Camille Rykowski ​ ​ (m.1967;div.1978)​ Kathleen Brown ​ (m.1985)​
Children	2

William De Witt Snodgrass(January 5, 1926 – January 13, 2009) was an American poet who also wrote under the pseudonymS. S. Gardons.He won the 1960Pulitzer Prize for Poetry.

Life

Snodgrass was born on January 5, 1926, inBeaver Falls,Pennsylvania, to Bruce De Witt, an accountant, and Jesse Helen (Murchie) Snodgrass. The family lived inWilkinsburg,but drove to Beaver Falls for his birth since his grandfather was a doctor in the town. Eventually the family moved to Beaver Falls and Snodgrass graduated from the local high school in 1943. He then attendedGeneva Collegeuntil 1944 when he was drafted into theUnited States Navy.After demobilization in 1946, Snodgrass transferred to theUniversity of Iowaand enrolled in theIowa Writers' Workshop,originally intending to become a playwright but eventually joining the poetry workshopwhich was attracting as teachers some of the finest poetic talents of the day, among themJohn Berryman,Randall JarrellandRobert Lowell.He received aBachelor of Artsdegree in 1949, aMaster of Artsdegree in 1951, and aMaster of Fine Artsdegree in 1953.

Snodgrass was known to friends throughout his life as "De", pronounced "dee",but only published using his initials. He had a long and distinguished academic career, having taught atCornell(1955-57),Rochester(1957-58),Wayne State(1959–68),Syracuse(1968-77),Old Dominion(1978-79), and theUniversity of Delaware.He retired from teaching in 1994to devote himself full-time to his writing. This included autobiographical sketches, essays, and the critical verse "deconstructions" ofDe/Compositions.He died in his home inMadison County, New York,aged 83, following a four-month battle with lung cancer,and was survived by his fourth wife, writer Kathleen Snodgrass.

Snodgrass had married his first wife, Lila Jean Hank, in 1946, by whom he had a daughter, Cynthia Jean. Their marriage ended in divorce in 1953 and it was the separation from his daughter as a result that became the subject of his first collection,Heart's Needle.The following year Snodgrass married his second wife, Janice Marie Ferguson Wilson. Together they have a son, Russell Bruce, and a stepdaughter, Kathy Ann Wilson. Divorcing again in 1966, he married his third wife, Camille Rykowski in 1967 but this ended in 1978. His fourth marriage to Kathleen Ann Brown was in 1985.

Literary career

Snodgrass's first poems appeared in 1951, and throughout the 1950s he published in magazines such asBotteghe Oscure,Partisan Review,The New Yorker,The Paris ReviewandThe Hudson Review.In 1957, five sections from a sequence entitled "Heart's Needle" were included inHall,PackandSimpson'santhology,New Poets of England and America.

By the timeHeart's Needlewas published as a book, in 1959, Snodgrass had wonThe Hudson ReviewFellowship in Poetry and anIngram Merrill FoundationPoetry Prize.Heart's Needleearned him a citation from thePoetry Society of America,a grant from the National Institute of Arts, and the 1960Pulitzer Prizein Poetry. It has been said thatHeart's Needleinauguratedconfessional poetry.Snodgrass disliked the term..His confessional work was to have a profound effect on many of his contemporaries, includingRobert Lowell.

The label of confessional poet affected his work and its reception (he was perceived by some to have "wrecked his career"). His later work moved in new directions:The Führer Bunkercycle of poems, monologues byAdolf Hitlerand his circle in the closing days of theThird Reich,began appearing as a "poem in progress" in 1977 and was finally completed in 1995. An adaptation of these for the stage was performed in the 1980s.Snodgrass satirized his former confessional style in a series of poems written in response to DeLoss McGraw'ssurrealisticpaintings, a collaboration that eventually grew into a partnership.

Bibliography

Poetry

• 1959:Heart's Needle
• 1968:After Experience: Poems and Translations
• 1968:Leaving the Motel
• 1970:Remains
• 1977:The Führer Bunker: A Cycle of Poems in Progress
• 1979:If Birds Build with Your Hair
• 1981:These Trees Stand
• 1982:Heinrich Himmler
• 1983:The Boy Made of Meat
• 1983:Magda Goebbels
• 1984:D. D. Byrde Callying Jennie Wrenn
• 1986:The Kinder Capers
• 1986:A Locked House
• 1987:Selected Poems: 1957-1987
• 1988:W. D.'s Midnight Carnival
• 1989:The Death of Cock Robin
• 1993:Each in His Season
• 1995:The Führer Bunker: The Complete Cycle
• 2006:Not for Specialists: New and Selected Poems

Prose

• In Radical Pursuit: Critical Essays and Lectures(1975)
• After-images: autobiographical sketches(1999)
• To Sound Like Yourself: Essays on Poetry(2002)

Drama

• The Führer Bunker(1981)

Anthologies

• Gallows Song(1967)
• Six Troubadour Songs(1977)
• Traditional Hungarian Songs(1978)
• Six Minnesinger Songs(1983)
• The Four Seasons(1984)
• Five Romanian Ballads, Cartea Romaneasca(1993)
• Selected Translations(1998) (Harold Morton Landon Translation Award)
• De/Compositions: 101 Good Poems Gone Wrong(2001)

Sources

• W. D. Snodgrass(Twayne's United States authors series; TUSAS 316) by Paul L. Gaston
• The Poetry of W. D. Snodgrass: Everything Human (Under Discussion)by Stephen Haven (Editor)
• No music, no poem: Interviews with W.R. Moses & W.D. Snodgrassby Roy Scheele
• W.D. Snodgrass: A bibliography by William White
• Tuned and Under Tension: The Recent Poetry of W.D. Snodgrass(edited by Philip Raisor)
• W.D. Snodgrass and The Führer bunker: an interview,Gaston
• The First Confessionalist,an interview with Ernest Hilbert inContemporary Poetry Review[3]
• An examination of "Discourses on the apostolical succession,by W.D. Snodgrass, D.D by William Johnson
• American Writers: A Collection of Literary Biographies, Supplement Vi, Don Delillo to W. D. Snodgrass,edited byJay Parini
• Everything Human: On the Poetry of W. D. Snodgrassby Richard Howard

External links

• A note on W D Snodgrass
• Alexandra Eyle (Spring 1994)."W. D. Snodgrass, The Art of Poetry No. 68".The Paris Review.Spring 1994 (130).
• Ernest Hilbert interview with W.D. Snodgrass.
• W.D. Snodgrassvideo atWeb of Stories
• [4]Michael Foldes, W.D. Snodgrass, Memoir, Ragazine.CC at[5]