Amy Clampitt (June 15, 1920 – September 10, 1994) was an

American poet The poets listed below were either born in the United States or else published much of their poetry while living in that country. A B C D E F G H I–J K L M N O P Q * George Quasha (born 1942) R S T U–V ...

and author.

Life

Clampitt was born on June 15, 1920, of

Quaker Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belief in each human's abili ...

parents, and brought up in

New Providence, Iowa New Providence is a small city in Hardin County, Iowa, United States. The population was 236 at the time of the 2020 census. History New Providence was laid out in 1855. New Providence was struck by a tornado in 1860 and much of its business di ...

. In the

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and at nearby

Grinnell College Grinnell College is a private liberal arts college in Grinnell, Iowa, United States. It was founded in 1846 when a group of New England Congregationalists established the Trustees of Iowa College. Grinnell has the fifth highest endowment-to-stu ...

she began a study of

English literature English literature is literature written in the English language from United Kingdom, its crown dependencies, the Republic of Ireland, the United States, and the countries of the former British Empire. ''The Encyclopaedia Britannica'' defines E ...

that eventually led her to poetry. She graduated from Grinnell College, and from that time on lived mainly in New York City. To support herself, she worked as a secretary at the

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print book ...

, a reference librarian at the

Audubon Society The National Audubon Society (Audubon; ) is an American non-profit environmental organization dedicated to conservation of birds and their habitats. Located in the United States and incorporated in 1905, Audubon is one of the oldest of such orga ...

, and a freelance editor. Not until the mid-1960s, when she was in her forties, did she return to writing poetry. Her first poem was published by ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

'' in 1978. In 1983, at the age of sixty-three, she published her first full-length collection, ''The Kingfisher''. In the decade that followed, Clampitt published five books of poetry, including ''What the Light Was Like'' (1985), ''Archaic Figure'' (1987), and ''Westward'' (1990). Her last book, ''A Silence Opens'', appeared in 1994. She also published a book of essays and several privately printed editions of her longer poems. She taught at the

College of William and Mary The College of William & Mary (officially The College of William and Mary in Virginia, abbreviated as William & Mary, W&M) is a public research university in Williamsburg, Virginia. Founded in 1693 by letters patent issued by King William ...

Smith College Smith College is a private liberal arts women's college in Northampton, Massachusetts. It was chartered in 1871 by Sophia Smith and opened in 1875. It is the largest member of the historic Seven Sisters colleges, a group of elite women's coll ...

, and

Amherst College Amherst College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Amherst, Massachusetts. Founded in 1821 as an attempt to relocate Williams College by its then-president Zephaniah Swift Moore, Amherst is the third oldest institution of higher educati ...

, but it was her time spent in Manhattan, in a remote part of Maine, and on various trips to Europe, the former Soviet Union, Iowa, Wales, and England that most directly influenced her work. Clampitt was the recipient of a 198
Guggenheim Fellowship

MacArthur Fellowship (1992)
and she was a member of the

and the American Academy of Poets. She died of cancer in September 1994.

Awards

Clampitt earned a MacArthur Fellowship in 1992 for her writing. She was also awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship for Creative Arts, US and Canada, in 1982, under the poetry category.

Works

Poetry collections

* ''Multitudes, Multitudes'' (Washington Street Press, 1973). * ''The Isthmus'' (1981). * ''The Summer Solstice'' (Sarabande Press, 1983). * ''The Kingfisher'' (Knopf, 1983). . * ''What the Light Was Like'' (Knopf, 1983). . * ''Archaic Figure'' (Knopf, 1987). . * ''Westward'' (Knopf, 1990). . * ''Manhattan: An Elegy, and Other Poems'' (University of Iowa Center for the Book, 1990). * ''A Silence Opens'' (Knopf, 1994). . * ''The Collected Poems of Amy Clampitt'' (Knopf, 1997). . * " A Homage to John Keats" (The Sarabande Press, 1984)

Prose

* ''A Homage to John Keats'' (Sarabande Press, 1984). * ''The Essential Donne'' (Ecco Press, 1988). . * ''Predecessors, Et Cetera: Essays'' (University of Michigan Press, 1991). .

References

External links

The Amy Clampitt FundClampitt's Academy of American Poets page"Clampitt, Amy: Introduction"
''Poetry Criticism.'' Vol. 19, edited by Carol T. Gaffke (Thomson Gale, 1997). * * Catherine Cucinella, ed.
Contemporary American Women Poets: An A-Z guide
{{DEFAULTSORT:Clampitt, Amy 1920 births 1994 deaths 20th-century American poets American women poets Amherst College faculty College of William & Mary faculty Grinnell College alumni MacArthur Fellows Smith College faculty 20th-century American women writers Members of the American Academy of Arts and Letters