Maurice Sagoff (1909 or 1910 – March 18, 1998) was an American poet best remembered for '' ShrinkLits'', his bestselling collection of

light verse Light poetry or light verse is poetry that attempts to be humorous. Light poems are usually brief, can be on a frivolous or serious subject, and often feature word play including puns, adventurous rhyme, and heavy alliteration. Nonsense poetry i ...

. Sagoff was born in

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is a suburb in the Greater Boston metropolitan area, located directly across the Charles River from Boston. The city's population as of the 2020 United States census, ...

. After graduating from

Boston College Boston College (BC) is a private university, private Catholic Jesuits, Jesuit research university in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1863 by the Society of Jesus, a Catholic Religious order (Catholic), religious order, t ...

he worked for one decade as a research librarian at the

Boston Public Library The Boston Public Library is a municipal public library system in Boston, Massachusetts, founded in 1848. The Boston Public Library is also Massachusetts' Library for the Commonwealth (formerly ''library of last recourse''), meaning all adult re ...

and for two decades at

Fairchild Publications Fairchild Media is a publisher of digital media, journalism, photography and design, events and summits, video and studios, and fashion. Fairchild Media brands include '' Women’s Wear Daily'', '' Footwear News'' (FN), ''Beauty Inc'', ''M'' and ...

as a regional editor. After his retirement in 1954 he wrote '' ShrinkLits: 70 of the World's Towering Classics Cut Down to Size'', a collection of literary classics condensed into terse

light poetry Light poetry or light verse is poetry that attempts to be humorous. Light poems are usually brief, can be on a frivolous or serious subject, and often feature word play including puns, adventurous rhyme, and heavy alliteration. Nonsense poetry i ...

. The book, published by Doubleday in 1970, became a ''New York Times'' bestseller. He subsequently published his poetry in a number of publications, including ''

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 ...

'' and '' Mademoiselle''. Though ''ShrinkLits'' was his only published book, shortly before his death in 1998 he had completed a new manuscript for a collection of clerihews.

References

* 1900s births 1998 deaths Poets from Massachusetts Boston College people Writers from Cambridge, Massachusetts 20th-century American poets Boston College alumni {{US-poet-stub