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Susan Howe

スーザン・ハウ

Susan Howe

Profile

Gender
Female
Born
1937-06-10 (Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.)
Nationality
United States
Languages
English
Residence History
Cambridge, Massachusetts → New York, NY → Guilford, Connecticut

Career

Occupations
Poet, Scholar, Essayist, Critic
Active Years
1974-
Affiliations
University at Buffalo, Poetics Program (faculty), American Academy of Arts and Sciences (member)
Memberships
American Academy of Arts and Sciences (member), Academy of American Poets (Chancellor)
Influenced By
Language poets (e.g., Charles Bernstein, Lyn Hejinian), Archival and historical documentary poetics

Education

School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts (formerly School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
Fine Arts
Period: 〜1961
Year of Graduation: 1961
Country: United States
After graduation she moved to New York and worked as a painter

Awards

American Book Award
1981
Organization: Before Columbus Foundation
Result: 受賞
American Book Award
1986
Organization: Before Columbus Foundation
Result: 受賞
Bollingen Prize in American Poetry
2011
Organization: Yale University
Result: 受賞
Robert Frost Medal
2017
Organization: Poetry Society of America
Result: 受賞
Berlin Prize
2009
Organization: American Academy in Berlin
Result: フェローシップ
Guggenheim Fellowship
Organization: John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation
Result: 受賞(年不明)
Roy Harvey Pearce Prize for Lifetime Achievement
Result: 受賞(年不詳)
Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
1999
Organization: American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Result: 選出

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

That This

2010 Poetry

A long poem weaving historical documents and fragments into discontinuous images and language to probe American history and personal memory.

historyarchivesmemory

Debths

2017 Poetry

A collection combining visual and prose-poetry elements, notable for formal experiments and historical references.

formal experimentationvoice and soundfragments of history

Souls of the Labadie Tract

2007 Poetry

An experimental work combining archival documents and poetic fragments to reconstruct historical voices.

archivesreconstructing voiceshistory

The Midnight

2003 Poetry

An experimental poetry collection that intersects personal and historical materials.

personal historyhistorical fragments

The Europe of Trusts

1990 Poetry

An early selected poems volume showing Howe's nascent historical concerns and formal experiments.

historyformlanguage experimentation

Bibliography

  • The Europe of Trusts (1990)
  • That This (2010)
  • Debths (2017)
  • Concordance (2020)
  • Souls of the Labadie Tract (2007)
  • The Midnight (2003)
  • Pierce-Arrow (1999)
  • My Emily Dickinson (1985)
  • Spontaneous Particulars: The Telepathy of Archives (2014)

Style & Themes

Literary Style
Postmodern, fragmentary and collage-like styleExperimental poetics that incorporates archival and historical textsLayered expression including sonic and visual elements
Recurring Motifs
history and archivesquotation and documentary recordsrepetition of voice and soundinterest in Emily Dickinson

Legacy

Susan Howe is known for archival-oriented experimental poetics and postmodern formal experimentation, exerting significant influence on Language poetry and contemporary poetry. She is highly regarded both academically and poetically.

Academic Societies

  • American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Archives

  • Susan Howe Papers, Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library
  • Susan Howe Papers, UC San Diego Special Collections (MSS 0201)

Trivia

  • Her mother was Irish playwright Mary Manning; a rumor that Samuel Beckett was her biological father was disproved by DNA tests.
  • Married painter Harvey Quaytman in 1961, later David von Schlegell, and later Peter Hewitt Hare (widowed); has two grown children, R.H. Quaytman and Mark von Schlegell.
  • Since 2003 she collaborated with musician David Grubbs and released several CDs.