Walter Bargen (born c. 1945) is an American poet, the first Poet Laureate of Missouri, a position which he held from February 13, 2008 to January 2010.

Biography

Born to an American father and a German mother, Bargen's childhood was spent traveling back and forth between Germany and the United States. In the early 1950s, he lived and played in the ruins of

Mannheim Mannheim (; Palatine German language, Palatine German: or ), officially the University City of Mannheim (), is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, second-largest city in Baden-Württemberg after Stuttgart, the States of Ger ...

Heidelberg Heidelberg (; ; ) is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, fifth-largest city in the States of Germany, German state of Baden-Württemberg, and with a population of about 163,000, of which roughly a quarter consists of studen ...

. In the 1960s, he settled in Missouri, working as a construction foreman, writing poetry on the side as a way of exploring the confusion caused by World War II. He wrote his first poem in high school, and has since been published in approximately one hundred magazines. His first book was published in 1980, ''Fields of Thenar''. In the 1990s, he wrote several works about Missouri, such as one volume which focused on the

Missouri River The Missouri River is a river in the Central United States, Central and Mountain states, Mountain West regions of the United States. The nation's longest, it rises in the eastern Centennial Mountains of the Bitterroot Range of the Rocky Moun ...

Awards

* 1991,

National Endowment for the Arts The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created in 1965 as an independent agency of the feder ...

poetry fellowship * 1996, Quarter after Eight Prose Prize * 1996, Hanks Prize * 1997, Chester H. Jones Foundation poetry prize

References

Page at Library of Congress
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External links

* http://www.walterbargen.com/ Living people 1940s births Year of birth uncertain Poets laureate of Missouri 20th-century American poets {{US-poet-1940s-stub