Howard Nemerov

"Nemerov" redirects here. For the surname, see Nemerov (surname).
Howard Nemerov
Born (1920-02-29)February 29, 1920
New York City, New York, USA
Died July 5, 1991(1991-07-05) (aged 71)
University City, Missouri, USA
Occupation Poet
Nationality United States
Alma mater Harvard College
Notable awards

National Book Award
1978

Pulitzer Prize
1978

Howard Nemerov (February 29, 1920 – July 5, 1991) was an American poet. He was twice Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, from 1963 to 1964 and again from 1988 to 1990.[1] For The Collected Poems of Howard Nemerov (1977), he won the National Book Award for Poetry,[2] Pulitzer Prize for Poetry,[3] and Bollingen Prize.

Nemerov was brother to photographer Diane Nemerov Arbus and father to art historian Alexander Nemerov, Professor of the History of Art and American Studies at Stanford University.

Biography

Born on Leap Day in New York City, his parents were David Nemerov and Gertrude. The Nemerovs were a Russian Jewish couple who lived in New York City and owned Russek's, a famous Fifth Avenue department store. His younger sister was the photographer Diane Arbus. The elder Nemerov's talents and interests extended to art connoisseurship, painting, philanthropy, and photography — talents and interests undoubtedly influential upon his son. Young Howard was raised in a sophisticated New York City environment where he attended the Society for Ethical Culture's Fieldston School. Graduated in 1937 as an outstanding student and second string team football fullback, he commenced studies at Harvard University where, in 1940, he was Bowdoin Essayist and he received bachelor's degree at this university. Throughout World War II, he served as a pilot, first in the Royal Canadian Air Force and later the U. S. Army Air Forces. He married in 1944, and after the war, having earned the rank of first lieutenant, returned to New York with his wife to complete his first book.

Nemerov then began teaching, first at Hamilton College and later at Bennington College, Brandeis University, and finally Washington University in St. Louis, where he was Edward Mallinckrodt Distinguished University Professor of English and Distinguished Poet in Residence from 1969 until his death in 1991. In 1999, Washington University dedicated a dormitory, The Howard Nemerov House, to him.[4] Nemerov's numerous collections of poetry include Trying Conclusions: New and Selected Poems, 1961-1991 (University of Chicago Press, 1991); The Collected Poems of Howard Nemerov (1977), which won the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, and the Bollingen Prize; The Winter Lightning: Selected Poems (1968); Mirrors and Windows (1958); The Salt Garden (1955); and The Image and the Law (1947). His novels have also been commended; they include The Homecoming Game (1957), Federigo: Or the Power of Love (1954), and The Melodramatists (1949).

Nemerov received many awards and honors, among them fellowships from The Academy of American Poets and The Guggenheim Foundation, a National Endowment for the Arts grant, the National Medal of Arts, the Bollingen Prize for Poetry, the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates,[5][6] and the first Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry.[7]

Nemerov served as poetry consultant to the Library of Congress in 1963 and 1964, as a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets beginning in 1976, and two terms as poet laureate of the United States from 1988 to 1990. In 1990 he was inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame.[8] Nemerov died of cancer in 1991 in University City, Missouri. The Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award was instituted in 1994 to honor him, and by 2008 about 3000 sonnets were entered annually in the associated competition.[9]

Poetry

Nemerov's work is formalist. He wrote almost exclusively in fixed forms and meter. While he is known for his meticulousness and refined technique, his work also has a reputation for being witty and playful. He is compared to John Hollander and Philip Larkin.

"A Primer of the Daily Round" is his most frequently anthologized poem, and highly representative of Nemerov's poetic style. It is an archetypal Elizabethan sonnet, demonstrative of the prosodic creativity for which Nemerov is famous. Another widely appreciated poem is "The War in the Air," which draws on his wartime experience as a pilot.[10]

Nemerov's "Because You Asked about the Line between Prose and Poetry" is frequently taught as an example of an Ars Poetica as it describes the nearly imperceptible change between rain and snow while still maintaining the formal poetic elements of rhyme and meter. A critical review by Mary Kinzie said of it: "the poem imperceptibly thickens itself out of the stream of prose."[11]

Bibliography

Poetry collections

.

Prose

Literary scholarship

References

  1. ↑ "Poet Laureate Timeline: 1961-1970". Library of Congress. 2008. Retrieved 2008-12-19.
  2. ↑ "National Book Awards – 1978". National Book Foundation. Retrieved 2012-04-07.
    (With acceptance speech by Nemerov and essay by Ross Gay from the Awards 60-year anniversary blog.)
  3. ↑ "Poetry". Past winners & finalists by category. The Pulitzer Prizes. Retrieved 2012-04-07.
  4. ↑ "Howard Nemerov House".
  5. ↑ Website of St. Louis Literary Award
  6. ↑ Saint Louis University Library Associates. "Recipients of the Saint Louis Literary Award". Retrieved July 25, 2016.
  7. ↑ Staff writers (18 January 1987). "Nemerov First Winner Of Taylor Poetry Prize". New York Times. Retrieved 2009-01-19.
  8. ↑ St. Louis Walk of Fame. "St. Louis Walk of Fame Inductees". stlouiswalkoffame.org. Retrieved 25 April 2013.
  9. ↑ Juster, Mike (October 2008). "So you want to win a Nemerov?". 14by14 (6). Retrieved 2009-03-25.
  10. ↑ "'The War in the Air' By Howard Nemerov". Poetry Foundation.
  11. ↑ Kinzie, Mary. "The Judge Is Rue". Poetry Magazine. Retrieved 16 July 2012.

External links

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