W. D. Snodgrass facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
W. D. Snodgrass
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| Born | William De Witt Snodgrass 5 January 1926 Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
| Died | 13 January 2009 (aged 83) Erieville, New York, U.S. |
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| Occupation | Poet, professor |
| Education | Geneva College University of Iowa (BA, MA, MFA) |
| Literary movement | Confessional poetry |
| Notable works | Heart's Needle |
| Notable awards | Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (1960) |
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| Children | 2 |
William De Witt Snodgrass (born January 5, 1926 – died January 13, 2009) was an American poet. He also wrote under the name S. S. Gardons. He won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1960. This is a very important award for writers in the United States.
Contents
Life of a Poet
Snodgrass was born on January 5, 1926, in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania. His family later moved there. He finished high school in Beaver Falls in 1943.
Education and Military Service
After high school, he went to Geneva College. In 1944, he joined the United States Navy during World War II. After the war, in 1946, Snodgrass went to the University of Iowa. He joined the Iowa Writers' Workshop, where he learned to write poetry. Famous poets like John Berryman and Robert Lowell taught there. He earned several degrees from the University of Iowa, including a Master of Fine Arts in 1953.
Teaching Career
Friends called Snodgrass "De." He taught at many universities during his life.
- Cornell (1955-1957)
- Rochester (1957-1958)
- Wayne State (1959–1968)
- Syracuse (1968-1977)
- Old Dominion (1978-1979)
- University of Delaware
He stopped teaching in 1994 to focus only on his writing. He wrote essays and critical poems. Snodgrass passed away in 2009 at the age of 83. He had been battling lung cancer.
Family Life
Snodgrass was married four times. His first marriage was to Lila Jean Hank in 1946. They had a daughter named Cynthia Jean. After their marriage ended, he wrote his first book of poems, Heart's Needle. These poems were about his feelings after separating from his daughter.
In 1954, he married Janice Marie Ferguson Wilson. They had a son, Russell Bruce. He later married Camille Rykowski in 1967 and Kathleen Ann Brown in 1985.
Literary Journey
Snodgrass started publishing poems in 1951. His work appeared in well-known magazines like The New Yorker.
Heart's Needle and its Impact
In 1957, some of his poems from a series called "Heart's Needle" were put into an important book of new poetry. When his full book Heart's Needle was published in 1959, it won many awards. The most important was the 1960 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry.
Heart's Needle is often seen as the start of a new style called confessional poetry. This style of poetry shares personal feelings and experiences. Snodgrass's honest writing greatly influenced other poets, including Robert Lowell.
New Directions in Poetry
Being known for "confessional poetry" affected his work. For many years, he published his poems with smaller publishers. He then explored new themes in his writing.
One new theme was a series of poems called The Führer Bunker. These poems were like monologues (speeches by one person) from Adolf Hitler and people around him during the last days of World War II. These poems were later adapted for the stage.
Another theme was a series of poems written in response to the surrealistic paintings of DeLoss McGraw. In these poems, Snodgrass used humor and rhymes. He also made fun of modern ideas, showing a different side to his writing style.
