Campbell McGrath (born 1962) is an American

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems ( oral or wri ...

. He is the author of nine full-length collections of poetry, including ''Seven Notebooks'' (

Ecco Press Ecco is a New York-based publishing imprint of HarperCollins. It was founded in 1971 by Daniel Halpern as an independent publishing company; Publishers Weekly described it as "one of America's best-known literary houses." In 1999 Ecco was acquire ...

, 2008), Shannon: A Poem of the Lewis and Clark Expedition (Ecco Press, 2009), and In the Kingdom of the Sea Monkeys (Ecco Press, 2012).

Life

McGrath was born in

Chicago, Illinois (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

, and grew up in

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

, where he attended

Sidwell Friends School Sidwell Friends School is a Quaker school located in Bethesda, Maryland and Washington, D.C., offering pre-kindergarten through high school classes. Founded in 1883 by Thomas W. Sidwell, its motto is ' ( en, Let the light shine out from all), a ...

; among his classmates was the poet Elizabeth Alexander. He received his B.A. from the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chic ...

in 1984 and his MFA from

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

's creative writing program in 1988, where he was classmates with

Rick Moody Hiram Frederick Moody III (born October 18, 1961) is an American novelist and short story writer best known for the 1994 novel ''The Ice Storm'', a chronicle of the dissolution of two suburban Connecticut families over Thanksgiving weekend in 19 ...

and Bruce Harris Craven. He currently lives in Miami Beach, Florida, and teaches creative writing at

Florida International University Florida International University (FIU) is a public research university with its main campus in Miami-Dade County. Founded in 1965, the school opened its doors to students in 1972. FIU has grown to become the third-largest university in Florid ...

, where his students have included

Richard Blanco Richard Blanco (born February 15, 1968) is an American poet, public speaker, author and civil engineer. He is the fifth poet to read at a United States presidential inauguration, having read the poem " One Today" for Barack Obama's second ...

, Susan Briante, Jay Snodgrass and

Emma Trelles Emma Trelles is a Latina poet, writer, professor, and current poet laureate of Santa Barbara, California. Life Trelles earned an MFA from Florida International University in the 1990s, where she was mentored by the poet Campbell McGrath and ...

. He is married to Elizabeth Lichtenstein, whom he met while he was an undergraduate; they have two sons.

Music

In the early 1980s, while a student at the

, he was a member of the punk band Men From The Manly Planet.

Awards

McGrath has been recognized by some of the most prestigious American poetry awards, including the

Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award The Kingsley and Kate Tufts Poetry Awards are a pair of American prizes based at Claremont Graduate University. They are given to poets for their collections of poetry written in the English language, by a citizen or legal resident alien of the ...

(for "Spring Comes to Chicago", his third book of poems), a Pushcart Prize, 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 ...

Prize, a ''

Ploughshares ''Ploughshares'' is an American literary journal established in 1971 by DeWitt Henry and Peter O'Malley in The Plough and Stars, an Irish pub in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Since 1989, ''Ploughshares'' has been based at Emerson College in Bos ...

Cohen Award Cohen may refer to: Places *Cohen-kuhi Tau/4, a star 420 light-years away from Earth in the Taurus Constellation *The Cohen Building of ''The Judd School'' in Tonbridge, England People * Cohen (surname), a common Jewish surname Arts, entertainm ...

, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a

Witter Bynner Fellowship Witter Bynner Fellowships are administered by the Library of Congress and sponsored by the Witter Bynner Foundation for Poetry, an organization that provides grant support for poetry programs through nonprofit organizations. Fellows are chosen by t ...

from the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...

, and a

MacArthur Foundation The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation is a private foundation that makes grants and impact investments to support non-profit organizations in approximately 50 countries around the world. It has an endowment of $7.0 billion and p ...

"Genius Award." In 2011 he was named a Fellow of

United States Artists United States Artists (USA) is a national arts funding organization based in Chicago. USA is dedicated to supporting living artists and cultural practitioners across the United States by granting unrestricted awards. Mission The organization' ...

. In 2017 McGrath was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry, along with

Adrienne Rich Adrienne Cecile Rich ( ; May 16, 1929 – March 27, 2012) was an American poet, essayist and feminist. She was called "one of the most widely read and influential poets of the second half of the 20th century", and was credited with bringing "the ...

Works

While primarily known as a poet, McGrath has also written a play, "The Autobiography of Edvard Munch" (produced by Concrete Gothic Theater, Chicago, 1983); a libretto for Orlando Garcia's experimental video opera "Transcending Time" (premiered at the New Music Biennalle, Zagreb, Croatia, 2009); collaborated with the video artist John Stuart on the video/poetry piece "14 Views of Miami" (premiered at The Wolfsonian, Miami, 2008); and translated the Aristophanes play The Wasps for the Penn Greek Drama Series.

Bibliography

Poetry

;Collections and chapbooks * * Capitalism (Wesleyan University Press, 1990) * American Noise (Ecco Press, 1993) * Spring Comes to Chicago (Ecco Press, 1996) * Road Atlas (Ecco Press, 1999) * Mangrovia (chapbook, Short Line Editions, 2001) * Florida Poems (Ecco Press, 2002) * Pax Atomica (Ecco Press, 2004) * Heart of Anthracite: New & Collected Prose Poems (Stride Press, UK) * Seven Notebooks (Ecco Press, 2008) * Shannon: A Poem of the Lewis and Clark Expedition (Ecco Press, 2009) * The Custodian & Other Poems (chapbook, Floating Wolf Quarterly, 2011) * In the Kingdom of the Sea Monkeys (Ecco Press, 2012) * XX: Poems For The Twentieth Century (HarperCollins, 2016) * Nouns & Verbs:New and Selected Poems (Ecco Press, 2019) * ''The Radiance Archive'' (forthcoming, 2023) ;List of poems

References

External links

Historian, comedian, storyteller:a conversation with poet Campbell McGrath
" Lyn Millner, ''Florida International University Magazine'', Fall 1999 issue.
Bio and notes on articles in ''Ploughshares''Excerpt from ''Pax Atomica'' at Harper Collins''Poetry Daily'' interview

Interview in ''BOMB''
{{DEFAULTSORT:McGrath, Campbell Living people Columbia University School of the Arts alumni MacArthur Fellows American male poets Florida International University people 1962 births