Howard Nemerov (March 1, 1920 – July 5, 1991) was an American poet. He was twice

Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress The Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress—commonly referred to as the United States Poet Laureate—serves as the official poet of the United States. During their term, the poet laureate seeks to raise the national cons ...

, from 1963 to 1964 and again from 1988 to 1990. For ''The Collected Poems of Howard Nemerov'' (1977), he won the National Book Award for Poetry,"National Book Awards – 1978"

National Book Foundation The National Book Foundation (NBF) is an American nonprofit organization established, "to raise the cultural appreciation of great writing in America". Established in 1989 by National Book Awards, Inc.,Edwin McDowell. "Book Notes: 'The Joy Luc ...

. Retrieved 2012-04-07.
(With acceptance speech by Nemerov and essay by Ross Gay from the Awards 60-year anniversary blog.)

Pulitzer Prize for Poetry The Pulitzer Prize for Poetry is one of the seven American Pulitzer Prizes awarded annually for Letters, Drama, and Music. It was first presented in 1922, and is given for a distinguished volume of original verse by an American author, published ...

,"Poetry"
''Past winners & finalists by category''. The Pulitzer Prizes. Retrieved 2012-04-07. and

Bollingen Prize The Bollingen Prize for Poetry is a literary honor bestowed on an American poet in recognition of the best book of new verse within the last two years, or for lifetime achievement.

. 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 Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is conside ...

Biography

Nemerov was born on March 1, 1920, in New York City; his parents were David Nemerov and Gertrude Russek. The Nemerovs were a

Russian Jewish The history of the Jews in Russia and areas historically connected with it goes back at least 1,500 years. Jews in Russia have historically constituted a large religious and ethnic diaspora; the Russian Empire at one time hosted the largest pop ...

couple who lived in New York City and owned Russeks, a

Fifth Avenue Fifth Avenue is a major and prominent thoroughfare in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It stretches north from Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village to West 143rd Street in Harlem. It is one of the most expensive shopping ...

department store. His younger sisters were the photographer

Diane Arbus Diane Arbus (; née Nemerov; March 14, 1923 – July 26, 1971
" The New York ...

and sculptor/painter Renee Nemerov Sparkia Brown. The elder Nemerov's talents and interests extended to art connoisseurship, painting,

philanthropy Philanthropy is a form of altruism that consists of "private initiatives, for the Public good (economics), public good, focusing on quality of life". Philanthropy contrasts with business initiatives, which are private initiatives for private goo ...

, 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 World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, he served as a pilot, first in the

Royal Canadian Air Force The Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF; french: Aviation royale canadienne, ARC) is the air and space force of Canada. Its role is to "provide the Canadian Forces with relevant, responsive and effective airpower". The RCAF is one of three environm ...

and later the

U.S. Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War ...

. 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 Hamilton College is a private liberal arts college in Clinton, Oneida County, New York. It was founded as Hamilton-Oneida Academy in 1793 and was chartered as Hamilton College in 1812 in honor of inaugural trustee Alexander Hamilton, following ...

and later at

Bennington College Bennington College is a private liberal arts college in Bennington, Vermont. Founded in 1932 as a women's college, it became co-educational in 1969. It claims to be the first college to include visual and performing arts as an equal partner in ...

Brandeis University , mottoeng = "Truth even unto its innermost parts" , established = , type = Private research university , accreditation = NECHE , president = Ronald D. Liebowitz , p ...

, 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. 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 The Academy of American Poets is a national, member-supported organization that promotes poets and the art of poetry. The nonprofit organization was incorporated in the state of New York in 1934. It fosters the readership of poetry through outreach ...

and The Guggenheim Foundation, a

National Endowment for the Arts The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal ...

grant, the

National Medal of Arts The National Medal of Arts is an award and title created by the United States Congress in 1984, for the purpose of honoring artists and patrons of the arts. A prestigious American honor, it is the highest honor given to artists and arts patrons ...

, the

Bollingen Prize The Bollingen Prize for Poetry is a literary honor bestowed on an American poet in recognition of the best book of new verse within the last two years, or for lifetime achievement.

for Poetry, the

St. Louis Literary Award The St. Louis Literary Award has been presented yearly since 1967 to a distinguished figure in literature. It is sponsored by the Saint Louis University Library Associates. Winners Past Recipients of the Award: *2023 Neil Gaiman *2022 Arundhat ...

from the

Saint Louis University Saint Louis University (SLU) is a private university, private Society of Jesus, Jesuit research university with campuses in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri, United States, and Madrid, Spain. Founded in 1818 by Louis William Valentine DuBourg, ...

Library Associates, the Golden Plate Award of the

American Academy of Achievement The American Academy of Achievement, colloquially known as the Academy of Achievement, is a non-profit educational organization that recognizes some of the highest achieving individuals in diverse fields and gives them the opportunity to meet ...

, and the first

Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry The Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry is an annual prize, administered by the ''Sewanee Review'' and the University of the South, awarded to a writer who has had a substantial and distinguished career. It was established through a beq ...

. 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. Nemerov died of cancer in 1991 in

University City, Missouri University City (colloquially, U. City) is an inner-ring suburb of the city of St. Louis in St. Louis County, in the U.S. state of Missouri. The population was measured at 35,065 by the 2020 census. The city is one of the older suburbs in the ...

. 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.

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 John Hollander (October 28, 1929 – August 17, 2013) was an American poet and literary critic. At the time of his death, he was Sterling Professor Emeritus of English at Yale University, having previously taught at Connecticut College, Hunter ...

and

Philip Larkin Philip Arthur Larkin (9 August 1922 – 2 December 1985) was an English poet, novelist, and librarian. His first book of poetry, ''The North Ship'', was published in 1945, followed by two novels, ''Jill'' (1946) and ''A Girl in Winter'' (1947 ...

. "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. 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." Nemerov also published a short story in the book ''Stories Selected from the Unexpected'' by Bennett Cerf under the pseudonym Joseph Cross called "Exchange of Men". http://www.philsp.com/homeville/anth/s194.htm

Bibliography

Poetry collections

*''The Image and the Law'' (1947) *''Guide to the Ruins'' (1950) *''The Vacuum'' (1955) *''The Salt Garden'' (1955) *''Mirrors and Windows'' (1958) *''The Next Room of The Dream: Poems and Two Plays'' (1962) *''The Blue Swallows'' (1967) *''The Winter Lightning: Selected Poems'' (1968) *''Gnomes & Occasions: Poems'' (1973) University of Chicago Press *''The Collected Poems of Howard Nemerov'' (1977) —winner of the National Book Award, Pulitzer Prize, and Bollingen Prize *''Sentences'' (1980) *''Inside the Onion'' (1984) *''War Stories: Poems about Long Ago and Now'' (1987) *''Trying Conclusions: New and Selected Poems, 1961-1991'' (1992) *''Grace to be Said at the Supermarket'' *''The War in the Air''

Prose

*''The Melodramatists'' (1949) *''Federigo: Or the Power of Love'' (1954) *''The Homecoming Game'' (1957) *''The Commodity of Dreams and Other Stories'' (1959) *''Journal of the Fictive Life'' (1965) *''Stories, Fables and Other Diversions'' (1971)

Literary scholarship

*''The Oak in the Acorn: On ''Remembrance of Things Past'' and on Teaching Proust, Who Will Never Learn'' (1987)

References

External links

*
Academy of American Poets - Biographical Sketch and Links to Poetry

* ttp://stlouiswalkoffame.org/inductee/howard-nemerov/ St. Louis Walk of Fame
Howard Nemerov "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Skylark" The Baltimore Museum of Art: Baltimore, Maryland, 1964
Accessed June 26, 2012 {{DEFAULTSORT:Nemerov, Howard American Poets Laureate American people of Russian-Jewish descent Jewish American poets Formalist poets Pulitzer Prize for Poetry winners Bollingen Prize recipients National Book Award winners United States National Medal of Arts recipients Washington University in St. Louis faculty Ethical Culture Fieldston School alumni Harvard College alumni Poets from Missouri Writers from New York City People from St. Louis County, Missouri Deaths from cancer in Missouri 1920 births 1991 deaths 20th-century American poets Russek family Royal Canadian Air Force personnel of World War II Canadian World War II pilots United States Army Air Forces pilots of World War II United States Army Air Forces officers