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Jorie Graham

ジョーリー・グレアム

Jorie Graham

Profile

Gender
Female
Born
1950-05-09 （New York City, U.S.）
Nationality
United States
Languages
English
Residence History
Raised in Rome, Italy → Resident in the United States (New York, Iowa, Harvard appointments)

Career

Occupations
poet, educator
Active Years
1974-
Affiliations
Iowa Writers' Workshop (faculty), Harvard University (Boylston Professor)
Memberships
Academy of American Poets (former Chancellor)
Influenced By
Wallace Stevens, Seamus Heaney
Influenced
Numerous contemporary American poets (including many former students)

Education

University of Paris (Sorbonne)
Philosophy (expelled/left)
Period: 1960年代後半〜1970年前後
Country: France
Participated in student protests and left/was expelled (per sources)
New York University
Film
Degree: BFA
Country: United States
Undergraduate film major; interest in poetry developed during this period.
University of Iowa (Iowa Writers' Workshop)
Creative writing (MFA)
Degree: MFA
Country: United States
Completed the renowned Iowa Writers' Workshop

Awards

Whiting Award
1985
Category: Poetry
Organization: Whiting Foundation
Result: Won
Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
1996
Work: The Dream of the Unified Field: Selected Poems 1974–1994
Category: Poetry
Organization: Pulitzer Prize Board
Result: Won
Forward Prize for Poetry (Best Collection)
2012
Work: P L A C E
Category: Collection
Organization: Forward Prizes
Result: Won
Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Poetry
2015
Work: From the New World: Poems 1976–2014
Category: Poetry
Organization: Los Angeles Times
Result: Won
Wallace Stevens Award
2017
Organization: Academy of American Poets
Result: Won
Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry
2018
Work: Fast
Category: Poetry
Organization: Library of Congress
Result: Won
International Nonino Prize
2013
Organization: Nonino
Result: Won
T. S. Eliot Prize
2012
Work: P L A C E
Organization: T. S. Eliot Prize
Result: Finalist
Neustadt International Prize for Literature
2012
Organization: Neustadt
Result: Finalist
Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (Finalist)
2024
Work: To 2040
Category: Poetry
Organization: Pulitzer Prize Board
Result: Finalist
MacArthur Fellowship
Organization: MacArthur Foundation
Result: Won

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

The End of Beauty

1987 Poetry collection

A watershed collection in which Graham's use of the longer line became prominent.

beautyexistencerelation between personal and historical

The Dream of the Unified Field: Selected Poems 1974–1994

1995 Poetry (selected poems)

Selected poems from 1974 to 1994. Winner of the 1996 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry.

search for unitymemoryintersection of science and poetry

P L A C E

2012 Poetry collection

A collection reflecting on space and place. Won the 2012 Forward Prize for Best Collection.

placeenvironmentsense of being

From the New World: Poems 1976–2014

2015 Poetry (selected poems)

A major collection gathering poems from eleven prior volumes plus new work. Won the 2016 L.A. Times Book Prize for Poetry.

historypersonal memoryenvironmental awareness

Fast

2017 Poetry collection

A recent collection that includes poetic experimentation and candid emotional expression. Winner of the 2018 Bobbitt Prize.

timethe bodyspeed and fragmentation

To 2040

2023 Poetry collection

A recent collection; was a Pulitzer Prize finalist.

perspective toward the futureenvironment and history

Bibliography

  • Hybrids of Plants and of Ghosts
  • Erosion
  • The End of Beauty
  • Region of Unlikeness
  • Materialism
  • The Dream of the Unified Field: Selected Poems 1974–1994
  • The Errancy
  • Swarm
  • Never
  • Overlord
  • Sea Change
  • P L A C E
  • From the New World: Poems 1976–2014
  • Fast
  • Runaway
  • [To] The Last [Be] Human
  • To 2040

Style & Themes

Literary Style
experimental long-line syntax and fragmented continuityphilosophical and memory-focused diction
Recurring Motifs
placerelationship between history and the individualnature and environment

Legacy

Jorie Graham is regarded as one of the leading poets of the American post-war generation; her long-line style has been influential. She has won major prizes including the Pulitzer and Forward Prize and has been a significant teacher of poets.

Academic Societies

  • Academy of American Poets

Quotes

  • Jorie Graham's masterful poems traverse almost four decades of inquiry into what it means to be in relation. Her work pulls forward our mythical, historical, environmental, and personal narratives in order to inhabit our most ordinary and collective experiences.
    Source: Claudia Rankine (Chancellor, Academy of American Poets) (2017)

Trivia

  • She was the first woman appointed to the Boylston Professorship at Harvard.
  • A 1999 prize-judging controversy involving a then-boyfriend/future husband led to wider adoption of competition rules often referred to as the 'Jorie Graham rule'.
  • Longtime faculty of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and influential teacher of many poets.