Karl Jay Shapiro (November 10, 1913 – May 14, 2000) was 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 w ...

. He was awarded the

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 ...

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for his collection ''V-Letter and Other Poems''. He was appointed the fifth

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 ...

in 1946. Born and initially raised in

Baltimore, Maryland Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic, and the 30th most populous city in the United States with a population of 585,708 in 2020. Baltimore wa ...

, Shapiro served in the Pacific Theater as a

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, ...

company clerk during

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Biography

Karl Shapiro was born and initially raised in

. After spending much of his childhood and adolescence 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 ...

, the family returned to Baltimore, where he completed his secondary education at

Baltimore City College Baltimore City College, known colloquially as City, City College, and B.C.C., is a college preparatory school with a liberal arts focus and selective admissions criteria located in Baltimore, Maryland. Opened in October 1839, B.C.C. is the thir ...

. He briefly attended the

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia. Founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson, the university is ranked among the top academic institutions in the United States, with highly selective ad ...

during the 1932-1933 academic year, and immortalized it in a scathing poem called "University", which noted that "to hurt the Negro and avoid the Jew is the curriculum." His first volume of poetry was published by a family friend at the behest of his uncle in 1935. After continuing his studies at the

Peabody Institute The Peabody Institute of The Johns Hopkins University is a private conservatory and preparatory school in Baltimore, Maryland. It was founded in 1857 and opened in 1866 by merchant/financier and philanthropist George Peabody (1795–1869) ...

(where he majored in piano performance), he attended

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hemisphere. It consi ...

on a scholarship from 1937 to 1939. In 1940, he enrolled in a

library science Library science (often termed library studies, bibliothecography, and library economy) is an interdisciplinary or multidisciplinary field that applies the practices, perspectives, and tools of management, information technology, education, an ...

school associated with Baltimore's

Enoch Pratt Free Library The Enoch Pratt Free Library is the free public library system of Baltimore, Maryland. Its Central Library and office headquarters are located on 400 Cathedral Street (southbound) and occupy the northeastern three quarters of a city block bounded ...

, where he was also employed. Shapiro wrote poetry in the Pacific Theater while he served there as a

company clerk during

. Throughout the conflict, he engaged in near-daily correspondence with his fiancée and first wife, Evalyn Katz (m. 1945-1967), who moved to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

to act as his

literary agent A literary agent is an agent who represents writers and their written works to publishers, theatrical producers, film producers, and film studios, and assists in sale and deal negotiation. Literary agents most often represent novelists, screenwrit ...

in 1942. In this capacity, Katz facilitated the publication of much of his early oeuvre. His collection ''V-Letter and Other Poems'', written while Shapiro was stationed in

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; id, Papua, or , historically ) is the world's second-largest island with an area of . Located in Oceania in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is separated from Australia by the wide Torres ...

, was awarded the

, while Shapiro was still in the military. From 1946 to 1947, he served as Consultant in Poetry to 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 libra ...

, succeeding

Louise Bogan Louise Bogan (August 11, 1897 – February 4, 1970) was an American poet. She was appointed the fourth Poet Laureate to the Library of Congress in 1945, and was the first woman to hold this title. Throughout her life she wrote poetry, fiction, ...

; this position was reclassified by Congress in 1985 as the

. Poems from his earlier books display a mastery of formal verse with a modern sensibility that viewed such topics as automobiles, house flies, and drug stores as worthy of attention. In 1963, the poet/critic

Randall Jarrell Randall Jarrell (May 6, 1914 – October 14, 1965) was an American poet, literary critic, children's author, essayist, and novelist. He was the 11th Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress—a position that now bears the title Poe ...

praised Shapiro's work:

Karl Shapiro's poems are fresh and young and rash and live; their hard clear outlines, their flat bold colors create a world like that of a knowing and skillful neoprimitive painting, without any of the confusion or profundity of atmosphere, of aerial perspective, but with notable visual and satiric force. The poet early perfected a style, derived from Auden but decidedly individual, which he has not developed in later life but has temporarily replaced with the clear Rilke-like rhetoric of his Adam and Eve poems, the frankly Whitmanesque convolutions of his latest work. His best poem--poems like "The Leg", "Waitress", "Scyros", "Going to School", "Cadillac"--have a real precision, a memorable exactness of realization, yet they plainly come out of life's raw hubbub, out of the disgraceful foundations, the exciting and disgraceful surfaces of existence.

In his later work, he repudiated the epochal influence of

Ezra Pound Ezra Weston Loomis Pound (30 October 1885 – 1 November 1972) was an expatriate American poet and critic, a major figure in the early modernist poetry movement, and a Fascism, fascist collaborator in Italy during World War II. His works ...

(whom he voted against in the inaugural

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.

deliberations in 1949, citing the poet's

antisemitism Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

) and T.S. Eliot, drawing instead upon the stylistic innovations of the

Beat Generation The Beat Generation was a literary subculture movement started by a group of authors whose work explored and influenced American culture and politics in the post-war era. The bulk of their work was published and popularized by Silent Genera ...

and its progenitors, including

Walt Whitman Walter Whitman (; May 31, 1819 – March 26, 1892) was an American poet, essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among ...

, D.H. Lawrence,

Dylan Thomas Dylan Marlais Thomas (27 October 1914 – 9 November 1953) was a Welsh poet and writer whose works include the poems " Do not go gentle into that good night" and " And death shall have no dominion", as well as the "play for voices" ''Und ...

Henry Miller Henry Valentine Miller (December 26, 1891 – June 7, 1980) was an American novelist. He broke with existing literary forms and developed a new type of semi- autobiographical novel that blended character study, social criticism, philosophical re ...

and

William Carlos Williams William Carlos Williams (September 17, 1883 – March 4, 1963) was an American poet, writer, and physician closely associated with modernism and imagism. In addition to his writing, Williams had a long career as a physician practicing both pedia ...

. However, Morris Dickstein would later opine that his "maverick role seemed strictly literary" vis-à-vis the

alternative lifestyles An alternative lifestyle is a lifestyle perceived to be outside the norm for a given culture. The phrase "alternative lifestyle" is often used pejoratively. Description of a related set of activities as alternative is a defining aspect of certain ...

of such Sixties "culture heroes" as

Norman Mailer Nachem Malech Mailer (January 31, 1923 – November 10, 2007), known by his pen name Norman Kingsley Mailer, was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, activist, filmmaker and actor. In a career spanning over six decades, Maile ...

and

Allen Ginsberg Irwin Allen Ginsberg (; June 3, 1926 – April 5, 1997) was an American poet and writer. As a student at Columbia University in the 1940s, he began friendships with William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, forming the core of the Beat Gener ...

. Nevertheless, this immersion led to experimentation with more open forms, beginning with ''The Bourgeois Poet'' (1964) and continuing with ''White-Haired Lover'' (1968). His interest in formal verse and prosody led to his writing multiple books on the subject, including the long poem ''Essay on Rime'' (1945), ''A Bibliography of Modern Prosody'' (1948), and ''A Prosody Handbook'' (with Robert Beum, 1965; reissued 2006). His ''Selected Poems'' appeared in 1968. Shapiro also published one novel, ''Edsel'' (1971), and a two-volume memoir (1988–1990). Although he never completed his undergraduate degree, Shapiro returned to Johns Hopkins as an

associate professor Associate professor is an academic title with two principal meanings: in the North American system and that of the ''Commonwealth system''. Overview In the '' North American system'', used in the United States and many other countries, it is ...

of writing from 1947 to 1950. Based again in Chicago, he served as the full-time editor of ''

Poetry Poetry (derived from the Greek '' poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meani ...

'' from 1950 to 1956. During this period, he served as a visiting professor at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant un ...

(1955–1956) and as a visiting fellow at

Indiana University Indiana University (IU) is a system of public universities in the U.S. state of Indiana. Campuses Indiana University has two core campuses, five regional campuses, and two regional centers under the administration of IUPUI. *Indiana Universi ...

(1956–1957). Thereafter, he returned to academia in earnest, serving as a professor of English and editor of ''

Prairie Schooner ''Prairie Schooner'' is a literary magazine published quarterly at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln with the cooperation of UNL's English Department and the University of Nebraska Press. It is based in Lincoln, Nebraska and was first publish ...

'' at the

University of Nebraska-Lincoln A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, th ...

for a decade (1956-1966). After briefly joining the faculty of the

University of Illinois Chicago The University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) is a Public university, public research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its campus is in the Near West Side, Chicago, Near West Side community area, adjacent to the Chicago Loop. The second campus esta ...

from 1966 to 1968, he moved to the

University of California, Davis The University of California, Davis (UC Davis, UCD, or Davis) is a public land-grant research university near Davis, California. Named a Public Ivy, it is the northernmost of the ten campuses of the University of California system. The inst ...

, where he became

professor emeritus ''Emeritus'' (; female: ''emerita'') is an adjective used to designate a retired chair, professor, pastor, bishop, pope, director, president, prime minister, rabbi, emperor, or other person who has been "permitted to retain as an honorary title ...

of English in 1985. His other works include ''Person, Place and Thing'' (1942), the libretto to

Hugo Weisgall Hugo David Weisgall (October 13, 1912 – March 11, 1997) was an American composer and conductor, known chiefly for his opera and vocal music compositions. He was born in Ivančice, Moravia (then part of Austria-Hungary, later in his childhood ...

's opera ''The Tenor'' (1950; with

Ernst Lert Ernst Joseph Maria Lert, originally Ernst Joseph Maria Levy (1883, Vienna – 1955, New York City) was an Austrian stage director, writer, composer, librettist, and music historian. He was the brother of conductor Richard Lert who was married to w ...

),'' To Abolish Children'' (1968) and ''The Old Horsefly'' (1993). Shapiro also received the 1969 Bollingen Prize, sharing the award with

John Berryman John Allyn McAlpin Berryman (born John Allyn Smith, Jr.; October 25, 1914 – January 7, 1972) was an American poet and scholar. He was a major figure in American poetry in the second half of the 20th century and is considered a key figure in th ...

Death and legacy

By 1984, Shapiro began to divide his time between California and an apartment in the Manhattan Valley section of the

Upper West Side The Upper West Side (UWS) is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It is bounded by Central Park on the east, the Hudson River on the west, West 59th Street to the south, and West 110th Street to the north. The Upper West ...

of Manhattan, where he initially spent at least half the year. He became a full-time resident of New York in 1994. In 1985, Richard Tillinghast of ''

The New York Times Book Review ''The New York Times Book Review'' (''NYTBR'') is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times'' in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely rea ...

'' asserted that Shapiro had become "more a name than a presence," and he obtained a settlement from the

American Medical Association The American Medical Association (AMA) is a professional association and lobbying group of physicians and medical students. Founded in 1847, it is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Membership was approximately 240,000 in 2016. The AMA's sta ...

after the organization "mistakenly included him in a list of writers who had committed suicide." As early as 1978, Shapiro had been erroneously characterized as a "late U.S. poet" in a ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

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clue. He died at a New York City

hospice Hospice care is a type of health care that focuses on the palliation of a terminally ill patient's pain and symptoms and attending to their emotional and spiritual needs at the end of life. Hospice care prioritizes comfort and quality of life b ...

, aged 86, on May 14, 2000. Survivors included his third wife, Sophie Wilkens (m. 1985), along with three grandchildren and one great-grandchild. More recent editions of his work include ''The Wild Card: Selected Poems Early and Late'' (1998) and the

John Updike John Hoyer Updike (March 18, 1932 – January 27, 2009) was an American novelist, poet, short-story writer, art critic, and literary critic. One of only four writers to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction more than once (the others being Booth Tar ...

-edited ''Selected Poems'' (2003). His last work, ''Coda: Last Poems,'' (2008) was recently published in a volume organized posthumously by editor Robert Phillips. The poems, divided into three sections according to love poems to Wilkens, poems concerning roses, and other various poems, were discovered in the drawers of Shapiro's desk by his wife two years after his death.

Awards

*Jeanette S Davis Prize and Levinson Prize, both from ''Poetry'', 1942 *Contemporary Poetry Prize, 1943 *American Academy of Arts and Letters grant, 1944 *Guggenheim Fellowships, 1944, 1953 *Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, 1945 *Shelley Memorial Prize, 1946 *Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, 1946–1947 *Indiana University School of Letters Fellowship, 1956–1957 *Eunice Tietjens Memorial Prize, 1961 *Oscar Blumenthal Prize, Poetry, 1963 *Bollingen Prize, 1969 *Robert Kirsch Award, ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the ...

'', 1989 *Charity Randall Citation, 1990 *Fellow in American Letters, Library of Congress

Bibliography

Poetry

*''Poems'' (1935) *''Person, Place, and Thing'' (1942) *''The Place of Love'' (1943) *''V-Letter and Other Poems'' (1944) *''Essay on Rime'' (1945) *''Trial of a Poet'' (1947) *''Poems of a Jew'' (1950) *''Poems 1940-1953'' (1953) *''The Bourgeois Poet'' (1964) *''Selected Poems'' (Random House, 1968) *''White Haired Lover'' (1968) *''Adult Bookstore'' (1976) *''Collected Poems, 1940–1978'' (1978) *''New and Selected Poems, 1940–1987'' (1988) *''The Old Horsefly'' (1993) *''The Wild Card: Selected Poems, Early and Late'' (1998) *''Selected Poems'' (Library of America, 2003), edited by

*''Coda: Last Poems'' (2008)

Memoir

*''The Younger Son'' (1988) *''Reports of My Death'' (1990)

Essays

*''The Poetry Wreck'' (1975) *''To Abolish Children and Other Essays'' (1968) *''A Primer for Poets'' (1965) *''In Defense of Ignorance'' (1960) *''Randall Jarrell'' (1967) *''Start With the Sun: Studies in the Whitman Tradition,'' with James E. Miller, Jr., and Bernice Slote (1963) *''Prose Keys to Modern Poetry'' (1962)

Novels

*''Edsel'' (1971)

Secondary sources

*Lee Bartlett, ''Karl Shapiro: A Descriptive Bibliography 1933-1977'' (New York: Garland, 1979) *Gail Gloston,'' Karl Shapiro, Delmore Schwartz, and Randall Jarrell: The Image of the Poet in the Late 1940s'' (Thesis: Reed College, 1957) *Charles F. Madden, ''Talks With Authors'' (Carbondale: Southern Illinois U. Press, 1968) * Hans Ostrom, "Karl Shapiro 1913-2000" (poem), in ''The Coast Starlight: Collected Poems 1976-2006'' (Indianapolis, 2006) *Joseph Reino, ''Karl Shapiro'' (New York: Twayne, 1981) *Stephen Stepanchev, ''American Poetry Since 1945: A Critical Survey'' (1965) * Melvin B. Tolson, ''Harlem Gallery'' (1965), with an introduction by Karl Shapiro *Sue Walker, ed., ''Seriously Meeting Karl Shapiro'' (Mobile: Negative Capability Press, 1993) *William White, ''Karl Shapiro: A Bibliography,'' with a note by Karl Shapiro (Detroit: Wayne State U. Press, 1960)

References

External links

* *
Shapiro Spanish TranslationKarl Shapiro papers
at the

University of Maryland libraries The University of Maryland Libraries is the largest university library in the Washington, D.C. - Baltimore area. The university's library system includes eight libraries: six are located on the College Park campus, while the Severn Library, an o ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Shapiro, Karl American Poets Laureate Formalist poets Baltimore City College alumni Jewish American poets Writers from Baltimore Writers from New York City Pulitzer Prize for Poetry winners University of California, Davis faculty University of Iowa faculty University of Nebraska–Lincoln faculty World War II poets 20th-century American male writers 1913 births 2000 deaths Bollingen Prize recipients 20th-century American poets American military personnel of World War II 20th-century American Jews