Charles Wright (poet)

Charles Wright in 2013. Photo by Slowking. Licensed under Creative Commons, courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Charles Wright (born August 25, 1935) is an American poet whose awards include the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize.

Life

Wright was born in Pickwick Dam, Tennessee.

He attended Davidson College and later the University of Iowa Writers' Workshop. He spent 4 years in the U.S. Armyy; he began to write poetry while stationed in Italy.

From 1966 to 1983, he taught at the University of California, Irvine. He is now a Chancellor of The Academy of American Poets and Souder Family Professor of English at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville.

His work appears in Blackbird: an online journal of literature and the arts.

Writing

Wright has written over 20 books of poetry, including Chickamauga, Buffalo Yoga, Negative Blue, Appalachia, The World of the Ten Thousand Things: Poems, 1980-1990, Zone Journals and Hard Freight. He has also published 2 works of criticism, Halflife and Quarter Notes.

Recognition

Wright's awards include the National Book Award for Poetry (1983) for Country Music: Selected Early Poems and the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry (1998) for Black Zodiac. His translation of Eugenio Montale's The Storm and Other Poems won him the PEN Translation Prize in 1979. In 1993, he received the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize for lifetime achievement.

Publications

Poetry

• The Voyage. Patrician Press, 1963.
• Six Poems. David Freed, 1965.
• The Dream Animal (chapbook). Toronto: Anansi, 1968.
• Private Madrigals (limited edition). Madison, WI: Abraxas Press, 1969.
• The Grave of the Right Hand. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1970.
• The Venice Notebook. Boston: Barn Dream Press, 1971.
• Backwater. Boulder, CO: Golem Press, 1973.
• Hard Freight. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1973.
• Bloodlines. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1975.
• China Trace. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1977.
• Colophons (limited edition). New York: Windhover, 1977.
• Wright: A profile (with interview and critical essay by David St. John). Iowa City, IA: Grilled Flowers Press, 1979.
• Dead Color (limited edition). Meadow Press, 1980.
• The Southern Cross. New York: Random House, 1981.
• Country Music: Selected early poems (includes Hard Freight, Bloodlines, & China Trace). Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1982.
• Four Poems of Departure (limited edition). Portland, OR: Trace Editions, 1983.
• The Other Side of the River. New York: Random House, 1984.
• Five Journals (limited edition). New York: Red Ozier Press, 1986.
• Zone Journals. New York: Farrar, Straus, 1988.
• The World of the Ten Thousand Things: Poems, 1980-1990 (includes The Southern Cross, The Other Side of the River, and Zone Journals). New York: Farrar, Straus, 1990.
• Xionia. Iowa City, IA: Windhover Press, 1990.
• Chickamauga. New York: Farrar, Straus, 1995.
• Black Zodiac. New York: Farrar, Straus, 1997.
• Appalachia. New York: Farrar, Straus, 1998.
• North American Bear. Winona, MN: Sutton Hoo, 1999.
• Negative Blue: Selected later poems (includes Chickamaunga, Black Zodiac, and Appalachia). New York: Farrar, Straus, 2000.
• A Short History of the Shadow. New York: Farrar, Straus, 2002.
• Buffalo Yoga. New York: Farrar, Straus, 2004.
• The Wrong End of the Rainbow. Louisville, KY: Sarabande, 2005.
• Scar Tissue. New York: Farrar, Straus, 2006.
• Littlefoot. New York: Farrar, Straus, 2007.
• Sestets. New York: Farrar, Straus, 2009.

Non-fiction

• Wright: A profile (with interview and critical essay by David St. John). Iowa City, IA: Grilled Flowers Press, 1979.
• Halflife: Improvisations and interviews, 1977-1987. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1988.
• Quarter Notes: Improvisations and interviews. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1995.

Translated

• Eugenio Montale, The Storm.Oberlin, OH: Oberlin College Press, 1978.
• Eugenio Montale, Motets. New York: Windhover, 1981.
• Dino Campana, Orphic Songs. Oberlin, OH: Oberlin College Press, 1984.

Charles Wright reads "No Angel"

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy the Poetry Foundation.

Audio / video

Poet Charles Wright Reads His Work

• The Tongue is a White Water (cassette). Washington, DC: Watershed Foundation, 1985.
• Poets in Person: Charles Wright with J.D. McClatchy; Rita Dove with Helen Vendler. Chicago: Modern Poetry Association, 1991.
• Charles Wright & Adrienne Rich (CD). New York: Academy of American Poets, 1997.

Except where noted, discographical information courtesy WorldCat.

See also

• List of U.S. poets

External links

• Two poems by Charles Wright
• Charles Wright b. 1935 at the Poetry Foundation
• Charles Wright profile & 14 poems at the Academy of American Poets
• Wright profile and poems at Blackbird, Spring 2004
• Charles Wright: Online poems

Audio / video

• Charles Wright at YouTube
• Wright reading 6 November 2007. Volume 7, No. 2 (Fall 2008) (Audio 30 mins)
• "Charles Wright Reads Selected Sestets and Other Poems", 10 December 2009, at the New York Review of Books. (Audio)
• Griffin Poetry Prize biography and video

Books

• Charles Wright at Amazon.com

About

• Charles Wright at Macmillan publishing
• Chalres Wright (1935- ) at Modern American Poetry
• J. D. McClatchy (Winter II 1989). "Charles Wright, The Art of Poetry No. 41". The Paris Review. http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/2369/the-art-of-poetry-no-41-charles-wright. 
• "Charles Wright: An Interview" by Daniel Cross Turner. storySouth Journal (Summer 2005)
• What We (non)Believe: Reading poems by Charles Wright, John Burnside, and Kevin Hart, Cordite Poetry Review, 2014.