James L. McMichael (born 1939) is an

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, p ...

poet and educator.

Life

The

Pasadena, California Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commerci ...

native, McMichael received his Ph.D. from

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

. In 1970, following the breakup of his first marriage, he married his second wife, Phylinda Wallace, a translator. They later divorced and he remarried. He has three children, Robert, Geoffrey and Owen. McMichael is a Professor Emeritus in the English department under the School of Humanities at the

University of California, Irvine The University of California, Irvine (UCI or UC Irvine) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Irvine, California, United States. One of the ten campuses of the University of California system, U ...

. "McMichael writes densely; his language is compacted, coiled, sprung (in

Hopkins Hopkins is an English and Welsh patronymic surname derived from the personal name Hopkin and the genitive ending -''s''. Hopkin is itself a pet form of the name Hobb, a shortening of Robert (with alteration of the initial consonant). Notable peop ...

's sense) and highly allusive. It is never simple or straightforward," writes Liz Rozenberg in a ''

Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe,'' also known locally as ''the Globe'', is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes. ''The Boston Globe'' is the oldest and largest daily new ...

'' review. Eric McHenry, in a brief review of ''Capacity'' in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'', wrote: "Since 1980, his cMichael'ssole contributions to the genre (excluding a "new and selected") have been three book-length poems, each strikingly different from the others and from anything else on the market. In ''Capacity'', he has exchanged the long lines and explicit autobiography of the previous two for dispassion, elision and lines as short as a syllable."

Awards

His first new poetry collection in a decade, ''Capacity'', was a finalist for the 2006

National Book Award for Poetry The National Book Award for Poetry is one of five annual National Book Awards, which are given by the National Book Foundation to recognize outstanding literary work by US citizens. They are awards "by writers to writers".

. He has been awarded a

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are Grant (money), grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, endowed by the late Simon Guggenheim, Simon and Olga Hirsh Guggenheim. These awards are bestowed upon indiv ...

, a 1995

Whiting Award The Whiting Award is an American award presented annually to ten emerging writers in fiction, nonfiction, poetry and drama Drama is the specific Mode (literature), mode of fiction Mimesis, represented in performance: a Play (theatre), play, ...

, the 1999 Arthur Rense Prize, the

Shelley Memorial Award The Shelley Memorial Award of the Poetry Society of America, was established by the will of Mary P. Sears, and named after the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley. The prize is given to a living American poet selected with reference to genius and need, and is ...

, and the Academy of American Poets' Fellowship.

Books

Poetry

*''Against the Falling Evil'' (Chicago:

Swallow Press Ohio University Press (OUP) is a university press associated with Ohio University. Founded in 1947, it is the oldest and largest scholarly press in the state of Ohio. Ohio University Press is also a member of the Association of University Presses ...

, 1971), *''The Lovers Familiar'' (Boston: David R. Godine, 1978), *''Four Good Things'' (Boston:

Houghton Mifflin The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a heraldic star. Computer scientists and mathematicians often vocalize it as ...

, 1980), , "a sprawling autobiographical meditation on life, death, and real-estate, set in ..Southern California" *''Each in a Place Apart'' (Chicago:

University of Chicago Press The University of Chicago Press is the university press of the University of Chicago, a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois. It is the largest and one of the oldest university presses in the United States. It pu ...

, 1994), *''The World at Large: New and Selected Poems, 1971-1996'', (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), *''Capacity'' (New York:

Farrar, Straus and Giroux Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG) is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger Williams Straus Jr. and John C. Farrar. FSG is known for publishing literary books, and its authors have won numerous awards, including Pulitzer P ...

, 2006), seven long poems including “The Begotten”.'Capacity' by James McMichael Coldfront
Jun 9, 2006 - The Great Famine of Ireland is something all but ignored in modern verse. In his sixth book, Capacity, James McMichael uses the poem “The Begotten” to remind us of its ugliness." *''If You Can Tell: Poems'' (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2016)

Other

*''The Style of the Short Poem'' (Belmont, Calif.: Wadsworth, 1967) *''Just What the Country Needs, Another Poetry Anthology'' (Belmont, Calif.: Wadsworth, 1971), , ed. with Dennis Saleh *''Ulysses and Justice'' (Princeton, N.J.:

Princeton University Press Princeton University Press is an independent publisher with close connections to Princeton University. Its mission is to disseminate scholarship within academia and society at large. The press was founded by Whitney Darrow, with the financial ...

, 1991), , a study of James Joyce

References

External links

University of California, Irvine faculty biographyProfile at The Whiting Foundation
{{DEFAULTSORT:McMichael, James L. 1939 births Living people American male poets University of California, Irvine faculty Writers from Pasadena, California Stanford University alumni