HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

David Ray (May 20, 1932 – August 8, 2024) was an American poet and author of fiction, essays, and memoir. He was particularly noted for poems that, while being rooted in the personal, also show a strong social concern. Ray was the author of twenty-two volumes of poetry, including "Hemingway: A Desperate Life" (2011), "When" (2007), "Music of Time: Selected and New Poems" (2006) and ''The Death of Sardanapalus and Other Poems of the Iraq Wars'' (2004). "After Tagore: Poems Inspired by Rabindranath Tagore" was published in India in 2008. Ray taught at several colleges in the United States, including
Cornell University Cornell University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university based in Ithaca, New York, United States. The university was co-founded by American philanthropist Ezra Cornell and historian and educator Andrew Dickson W ...
,
Reed College Reed College is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Portland, Oregon, United States. Founded in 1908, Reed is a residential college with a campus in the Eastmoreland, Portland, Oregon, E ...
, the
University of Iowa The University of Iowa (U of I, UIowa, or Iowa) is a public university, public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is organized int ...
Writers' Workshop, and the
University of Missouri-Kansas City A university () is an institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars". Univ ...
, where he was professor emeritus. He also taught in India, New Zealand, and Australia, and published books inspired by the cultures of each country. Among other prizes, including an N.E.A. fellowship for fiction and five P.E.N. Newspaper Syndicate Awards for short stories, David Ray was a two-time winner of the
William Carlos Williams Award The William Carlos Williams Award is given out by the Poetry Society of America for a poetry book published by a small press, non-profit, or university press. The award is endowed by the family and friends of Geraldine Clinton Little, a poet an ...
from the
Poetry Society of America Poetry (from the Greek word '' poiesis'', "making") is a form of literary art that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language to evoke meanings in addition to, or in place of, literal or surface-level meanings. Any partic ...
. Ray died on August 8, 2024, at the age of 92.


Biography

Ray was born in Sapulpa,
Oklahoma Oklahoma ( ; Choctaw language, Choctaw: , ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Texas to the south and west, Kansas to the north, Missouri to the northea ...
in 1932. Ray comes from a broken home that was thrown into upheaval when his father left the family by hopping on the back of a watermelon truck headed to California. After his mother's next failed marriage ended in the suicide of Ray's stepfather, he and his sister Mary Ellen were placed into foster care—a system that wasn't kind to young children in the late 1930s and early 1940s. Ray's classic "Mulberries of Mingo" steeps from memories of he and his sister being thrown out of a foster families home at dinner time - to fend for themselves eating the mulberries from a neighbor's tree. The years that followed were dark and tragic as he and his sister were separated to face their separate nightmares of abuse. He is a distinguished award winner, and has lectured and read at over 100 Universities in England, Canada and the U.S. Graduating from the University of Chicago, BA, MA; he became a co-founder of the American Writers Against the Vietnam War, and has been commonly quoted in recent anti-war actions. Ray's poetry varies from short, three to four lines pieces, to longer 30 lines poems. His work is also often autobiographical, providing unique context and insight to scenes of childhood, love, fear, sex, and travel. "Communication is important to him, and he has the courage, working with a genre in which simplicity is suspect, to say plainly what he means." 1 Some of his awards include the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation Poetry Prize (2001), the Allen Ginsberg Poetry Award (1997), the
Maurice English Poetry Award Maurice may refer to: *Maurice (name), a given name and surname, including a list of people with the name Places * or Mauritius, an island country in the Indian Ocean *Maurice, Iowa, a city *Maurice, Louisiana, a village *Maurice River, a trib ...
(1988) for ''Sams Book'', and he has been a two-time winner of the William Carlos Williams prize from th
Poetry Society of America
(1979, 1994) for "The Tramp's Cup" and ''Wool Highways''. Ray's poetry is individual yet strongly social, allowing him freedom to relate to a wide demographic. With Robert Bly, David co-founded American Writers Against the Vietnam War in 1966 and they co-edited A POETRY READING AGAINST THE VIETNAM WAR, a collection of relevant readings from the classics as well as contemporary sources. 5 He is the founding editor o
''New Letters Magazine''
an
''New Letters on the Air''
. His work has appeared in Harper's, The Paris Review, The New Yorker, The Iowa Review, and many others. He has also held faculty positions at Cornell, University of Missouri-Kansas City, University of Iowa, and Reed, as well as visiting positions at Syracuse, and universities in India, Australia, and New Zealand. 2 The David Ray Poetry Award: Named in his honor, this award was sponsored by the now defunct journal ''Potpourri; A Magazine of the Literary Arts''. Recipients have included poets Lee Price, Carol Hamilton, and David Beard.


Selected bibliography

* ''X-Rays'' (
1965 Events January–February * January 14 – The First Minister of Northern Ireland and the Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland meet for the first time in 43 years. * January 20 ** Lyndon B. Johnson is Second inauguration of Lynd ...
) * "Dragging the Main" (1968) * ''Gathering Firewood: New Poems and Selected'' (
1974 Major events in 1974 include the aftermath of the 1973 oil crisis and the resignation of United States President Richard Nixon following the Watergate scandal. In the Middle East, the aftermath of the 1973 Yom Kippur War determined politics; ...
) * ''Elysium in the Halls of Hell'' (
1989 1989 was a turning point in political history with the "Revolutions of 1989" which ended communism in Eastern Bloc of Europe, starting in Poland and Hungary, with experiments in power-sharing coming to a head with the opening of the Berlin W ...
) * ''Kangaroo Paws: Poems Written in Australia'' (
1994 The year 1994 was designated as the " International Year of the Family" and the "International Year of Sport and the Olympic Ideal" by the United Nations. In the Line Islands and Phoenix Islands of Kiribati, 1994 had only 364 days, omitti ...
) * ''The Endless Search: A Memoir'' (
2003 2003 was designated by the United Nations as the International Year of Fresh water, Freshwater. In 2003, a Multi-National Force – Iraq, United States-led coalition 2003 invasion of Iraq, invaded Iraq, starting the Iraq War. Demographic ...
) * ''The Death of Sardanapalus and Other Poems of the Iraq Wars'' (
2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and Its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 60 ...
) * ''One Thousand Years: Poems about the Holocaust''. Timberline Press, 2004 * ''Demons in the Diner''. Ashland Poetry Press, 1998. * ''Wool Highways''. Helicon Nine Editions, 1993. * ''Not Far From the River''. Copper Canyon Press, 1990. * ''The Maharani's New Wall''. Wesleyan Univ. Press, 1989. * ''Sam's Book''. Wesleyan Univ. Press, 1987. * ''The Touched Life''. Scarecrow Press, 1989. * ''The Tramp's Cup''. Chariton Review Press, 1978. * "Music of Time: Selected and New Poems". Backwaters Press, 2006. * "When". (Howling Dog Press/Omega Editions, 2007) * "After Tagore: Poems Inspired by Rabindranath Tagore". (Nirala Editions, 2008) * "Hemingway: A Desperate Life" (Whirlybird Press, 2011)


Reviews

-Seanna Oakley (Ph.D. English, University of Wisconsin-Madison), on ''The Endless Search: A Memoir'': "How can the quiet ache of poet David Ray's memoir, The Endless Search, compete in a market voracious for what reviewer Chris Leman calls the 'extreme-memoir' genre of current best-selling memoirs in the United States?... Ray's search for reconciliation with a childhood of abuse and neglect assumes a modesty that runs counter to expectations shaped by contemporary memoir bestsellers. From disclosures of sexual abuse to 'peeping tom' voyeurism, Ray recounts shameful episodes from the past no less candidly than other memoirists. Yet the restraint that governs his evaluation of the multitude of parents and their proxies, relatives, guardians, and orphanage officials whose collective actions unambiguously disavow his value as a human being is striking enough to capture readers disenchanted by the prolix confessionals of the last two decades...." -F.D. Reeve (Professor of Russian, Wesleyan University), on ''The Death of Sardanapalus''): "There is nothing like this book in American poetry today, for it is the skilled work of a craftsman whose fine ear and deft control distinguish every poem, all of which cry out against the barbarism of war and the stupid cruelties of those who make it. From the clever metaphoric transition of "The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier" to the deeply moving elegy to Wilfred Owen, this collection of intense lyrics shines with intelligence and passion." -Anslem Hollo (Professor of writing and poetics, Naropa University), on ''The Death of Sardanapalus'': "In a time of imperial wars abroad and religious wars at home, David Ray's eloquent meditations speak to all who hope and work for change." -Philip Schultz (Director of writers studio in NYC), on ''The Death of Sardanapalus'': "Zbigniew Herbert uses irony to mask his great vulnerability in the face of oppression. David Ray uses a detached classicism to distance himself (and us) from the present horror. But the outrage is there, and the great sadness. I admire these poems, and his courage in writing them." -Kirkus Review, on ''The Endless Search: A Memoir'': "Two-time winner of the William Carlos Williams Award from the Poetry Society of America, Ray (English Emeritus/Univ. of Missouri) is one of only a handful of poets to garner a following among nonacademics. While selections of his poetry, eloquent and intensely personal, are scattered throughout the present volume, the topic at hand concerns a boy ever in search of his missing father, or a surrogate. After growing up in Oklahoma during the Depression, son of a dirt-poor sharecropper and an obsessive mother who hated dirt in all its forms, Ray was shuffled among relatives and foster homes, later spending time on an Arizona ranch. He became self-supporting as a teenager and won a scholarship to the University of Chicago. A stint in that city as a social worker gave him insights into his own childhood and the generations of American men who grew up without a male role model. Ray describes the string of "uncles" with whom his mother sought security and a proper home life, as well as the wealthy guardian who both tormented and sexually abused him during a childhood comprising parts of Great Expectations and Oliver Twist. The author's frank account, unlike many in the current canon of victimology, is almost lyrical, while remaining unglamorized and unsentimental throughout. Ray's quest is alternately heartbreaking and chilling, yet he never lapses into
narcissism Narcissism is a self-centered personality style characterized as having an excessive preoccupation with oneself and one's own needs, often at the expense of others. Narcissism, named after the Greek mythological figure ''Narcissus'', has evolv ...
or
self-pity Self-pity is an emotion in which one feels self-centered sorrow and pity toward the self regarding one's own internal and external experiences of suffering. Self-pity has also been defined as an emotion "directed towards others with the goal of ...
. He goes astray only when drawing broader conclusions, suggesting, for instance, that it is homophobia that drives the pedophile and the sadist. The personal conclusions Ray draws, however, and the triumph of spirit his life demonstrates are much more important. A riveting and well-written narrative of abuse."


See also

*
List of poetry awards Major international awards * Struga Poetry Evenings, Golden Wreath of Struga Poetry Evenings * Bridges of Struga (for a debuting author at Struga Poetry Evenings) * Griffin Poetry Prize (The international prize) * International Hippocrates Priz ...


Notes


References

* Dictionary of Literary Biography, Vol. 5: American Poets Since WWII. Detroit, MI, 1980, pp. 175–80. * Contemporary Poets, Sixth Ed, St. James Press, Detroit, MI, 1996.
DavidRaypoet.com, referenced October 25, 2006


* Carruth, Hayden, ''Poetic Tradition and the Individual Talent''. Harpers, p. 258, May 1979. * Coleman, Elliot, ''Priceless Catch''. Nation, pp. 345–346, March 1969.


External links


David Ray

Video of Ray reading a poem written to Cindy Sheehan, the mother of a soldier killed in Iraq


{{DEFAULTSORT:Ray, David 1932 births 2024 deaths American male poets University of Chicago alumni Cornell University faculty People from Sapulpa, Oklahoma