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{{Short description|American writer (1929–2022)}}
{{Short description|American poet (1929–2022)}}
{{Other people}}
{{Other people}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=June 2019}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=June 2019}}
{{Infobox person/Wikidata|fetchwikidata=ALL}}
{{Infobox poet
| name = Richard Howard
⚫
'''Richard Joseph Howard''' (October 13, 1929 – March 31, 2022;<ref>[https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/31/books/richard-howard-dead.html Richard Howard, Acclaimed Poet and Translator, Dies at 92] {{paywall}}</ref> adopted as '''Richard Joseph Orwitz''') was an American poet, [[literary critic]], essayist, teacher, and translator. He was born in [[Cleveland]], Ohio, and was a graduate of [[Columbia University]], where he studied under [[Mark Van Doren]],<ref name=co>[http://www.c250.columbia.edu/c250_celebrates/remarkable_columbians/mark_van_doren.html "Mark Van Doren", ''Columbia 250'' – Colombian Ahead of Their Times] [[Columbia University]].</ref> and where he was an emeritus professor. He lived in [[New York City]].
| birth_name = Richard Joseph Howard
| birth_date = {{birth date|1929|10|13}}
| birth_place = [[Cleveland]], [[Ohio]], U.S.
| death_date = {{death date and age|2022|3|31|1929|10|13}}
| death_place = [[New York City]], [[New York (state)|New York]], U.S.
| education = [[Columbia University]] ([[Bachelor of Arts|BA]])<br>[[University of Paris]]
| awards = [[Guggenheim Fellowship]] (1966)<br>[[MacArthur Fellows Program]] (1996)<br>[[Pulitzer Prize for Poetry]] (1970)<br>[[National Book Award]] (1983)
}}
⚫
'''Richard Joseph Howard''' (October 13, 1929 – March 31, 2022),<ref>[https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/31/books/richard-howard-dead.html Richard Howard, Acclaimed Poet and Translator, Dies at 92] {{subscription required}}</ref> adopted as '''Richard Joseph Orwitz''', was an American poet, [[literary critic]], essayist, teacher, and translator. He was born in [[Cleveland]], Ohio, and was a graduate of [[Columbia University]], where he studied under [[Mark Van Doren]],<ref name=co>[http://www.c250.columbia.edu/c250_celebrates/remarkable_columbians/mark_van_doren.html "Mark Van Doren", ''Columbia 250'' – Colombian Ahead of Their Times] [[Columbia University]].</ref> and where he was an emeritus professor. He lived in [[New York City]].


==Life==
==Life==
After reading French letters at the [[University of Paris|Sorbonne]] in 1952–53, Howard had a brief early career as a [[lexicographer]]. He soon turned his attention to poetry and poetic criticism, and won the [[Pulitzer Prize]] for poetry for his 1969 collection ''[[Untitled Subjects]]'', which took for its subject dramatic imagined letters and monologues of 19th century historical figures. For much of his career, Howard composed poems employing a [[quantitative verse]] technique.
After reading French letters at the [[University of Paris|Sorbonne]] in 1952–53, Howard had a brief early career as a [[lexicographer]]. He soon turned his attention to poetry and poetic criticism, and won the [[Pulitzer Prize]] for poetry for his 1969 collection ''[[Untitled Subjects]]'', which took for its subject dramatic imagined letters and monologues of 19th-century historical figures. For much of his career, Howard composed poems employing a [[quantitative verse]] technique.


A prolific literary critic, Howard's monumental 1969 volume ''[[Alone With America]]'' stretches to 594 pages<ref name=Alone>Howard, Richard. ''Alone With America: Essays on the Art of Poetry in the United States Since 1950''. New York: Atheneum, 1969.</ref> and profiles 41 American poets who had published at least two books each and "have come into a characteristic and&mdash;as I see it&mdash;consequential identity since the time, say, of the [[Korean War]]." Howard would later tell an interviewer <blockquote>I wrote the book not for the sense of history, but for myself, knowing that a relation to one's moment was essential to getting beyond the moment. As I quoted [[George Bernard Shaw|Shaw]] in the book's preface, if you cannot believe in the greatness of your own age and inheritance, you will fall into confusion of mind and contrariety of spirit. The book was a rescuing anatomy of such belief, the construction of a ''credendum''—articles of faith, or at least appreciation.<ref name=ParisReview>[http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/29/the-art-of-poetry-no-86-richard-howard Richard Howard, The Art of Poetry No. 86], ''The Paris Review'', interview by [[J. D. McClatchy]], Spring 2004</ref></blockquote>
A prolific literary critic, Howard's monumental 1969 volume ''[[Alone With America]]'' stretches to 594 pages<ref name=Alone>Howard, Richard. ''Alone With America: Essays on the Art of Poetry in the United States Since 1950''. New York: Atheneum, 1969.</ref> and profiles 41 American poets who had published at least two books each and "have come into a characteristic and&mdash;as I see it&mdash;consequential identity since the time, say, of the [[Korean War]]." Howard would later tell an interviewer <blockquote>I wrote the book not for the sense of history, but for myself, knowing that a relation to one's moment was essential to getting beyond the moment. As I quoted [[George Bernard Shaw|Shaw]] in the book's preface, if you cannot believe in the greatness of your own age and inheritance, you will fall into confusion of mind and contrariety of spirit. The book was a rescuing anatomy of such belief, the construction of a ''credendum''—articles of faith, or at least appreciation.<ref name=ParisReview>[http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/29/the-art-of-poetry-no-86-richard-howard Richard Howard, The Art of Poetry No. 86], ''The Paris Review'', interview by [[J. D. McClatchy]], Spring 2004</ref></blockquote>
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--><ref name=nba1983>
--><ref name=nba1983>
[https://www.nationalbook.org/awards-prizes/national-book-awards-1983 "National Book Awards – 1983"]. [[National Book Foundation]]. Retrieved 2012-03-10. <br>There was a "Translation" award from 1966 to 1983.</ref>
[https://www.nationalbook.org/awards-prizes/national-book-awards-1983 "National Book Awards – 1983"]. [[National Book Foundation]]. Retrieved 2012-03-10. <br>There was a "Translation" award from 1966 to 1983.</ref>
for his 1983 translation of [[Baudelaire]]'s ''[[Les Fleurs du mal]]''. Howard was a long-time poetry editor of ''[[The Paris Review]]''. He received a [[Pulitzer prize]], the [[Academy of Arts and Letters]] Literary Award and a [[MacArthur Fellowship]]. In 1985, Howard received the [[PEN/Ralph Manheim Medal for Translation]]. A past Chancellor of the [[Academy of American Poets]], he was Professor of Practice in the writing program at Columbia's [[Columbia University School of the Arts|School of the Arts]]. He was previously [[University Professor]] of [[English studies|English]] at the [[University of Houston]] and, before that, Ropes Professor of [[Comparative Literature]] at the [[University of Cincinnati]]. He served as [[Poet Laureate]] of the [[State of New York]] from 1993 to 1995.<ref>{{cite web|title=New York|url=https://www.loc.gov/rr/main/poets/newyork.html|work=US State Poets Laureate|publisher=Library of Congress|access-date=May 8, 2012}}</ref>
for his 1983 translation of [[Baudelaire]]'s ''[[Les Fleurs du mal]]''. He was the longest-serving Poetry Editor of ''[[The Paris Review]]'', from 1992 until 2005. He received a [[Pulitzer prize]], the [[Academy of Arts and Letters]] Literary Award and a [[MacArthur Fellowship]]. In 1985, Howard received the [[PEN/Ralph Manheim Medal for Translation]]. A past Chancellor of the [[Academy of American Poets]], he was a Professor of Practice in the writing program at Columbia's [[Columbia University School of the Arts|School of the Arts]]. He was previously [[University Professor]] of [[English studies|English]] at the [[University of Houston]] and, before that, Ropes Professor of [[Comparative Literature]] at the [[University of Cincinnati]]. He served as [[Poet Laureate]] of the [[State of New York]] from 1993 to 1995.<ref>{{cite web|title=New York|url=https://www.loc.gov/rr/main/poets/newyork.html|work=US State Poets Laureate|publisher=Library of Congress|access-date=May 8, 2012}}</ref>


In 1982, Howard was named a [[knight|Chevalier]] of [[L'Ordre National du Mérite]] by the government of France.
In 1982, Howard was named a [[knight|Chevalier]] of [[L'Ordre National du Mérite]] by the government of France.
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== Personal life ==
== Personal life ==


Richard Howard was born to poor [[Jews|Jewish]] parents. His last name at birth is unknown. He was adopted as an infant by Emma Joseph and Harry Orwitz, a middle-class Cleveland couple, who were also Jewish; his mother changed their last names to "Howard" when he was an infant, after she divorced Orwitz. Howard never met his birth parents, nor his sister, who was adopted by another local family.<ref name=Jewish>[http://www.forward.com/articles/15078/ "Praising Sacred Places: Richard Howard's Jewish Roots"], article by [[Benjamin Ivry]] in ''The Forward''.</ref> Howard was gay, a fact that comes up frequently in his later work.<ref>[http://clevelandartsprize.org/awardees/richard_howard.html Official biography at Cleveland Arts Prize website]</ref> He was [[coming out|out]] to some degree since at least the 1960s, when he remarked to friend [[W. H. Auden]] that he was offended by a fellow poet's use of Jewish and gay epithets, "since [he was] both these things", to which Auden replied, "My dear, I never knew you were Jewish!"<ref name=Jewish />
Richard Howard was born to poor [[Jews|Jewish]] parents. His last name at birth is unknown. He was adopted as an infant by Emma Joseph and Harry Orwitz, a middle-class Cleveland couple, who were also Jewish; his mother changed their last names to "Howard" when he was an infant after she divorced Orwitz. Howard never met his birth parents, nor his sister, who was adopted by another local family.<ref name=Jewish>[http://www.forward.com/articles/15078/ "Praising Sacred Places: Richard Howard's Jewish Roots"], article by [[Benjamin Ivry]] in ''The Forward''.</ref> Howard was gay, a fact that comes up frequently in his later work.<ref>[http://clevelandartsprize.org/awardees/richard_howard.html Official biography at Cleveland Arts Prize website]</ref> He was [[coming out|out]] to some degree since at least the 1960s, when he remarked to friend [[W. H. Auden]] that he was offended by a fellow poet's use of Jewish and gay epithets, "since [he was] both these things", to which Auden replied, "My dear, I never knew you were Jewish!"<ref name=Jewish />


Howard kept on his bed in a nook of his New York City apartment a large stuffed gorilla named "Mildred".<ref name=ParisReview />
Howard was renowned for the extreme number of books that he had collected over his lifetime and which famously lined the walls of his New York City apartment. Additionally, he kept on his bed, a large stuffed gorilla named "Mildred".<ref name=ParisReview />


==Works==
==Works==
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* ''Without Saying'' (2008)
* ''Without Saying'' (2008)
* ''A Progressive Education'' (2014)
* ''A Progressive Education'' (2014)
* ''Richard Howard Loves Henry James and Other American Writers'' (2020)


===Critical essays===
===Critical essays===
Line 57: Line 67:


===Major translations (French to English)===
===Major translations (French to English)===
* ''The Traitor'' by [[André Gorz]]
* ''The Unknown Masterpiece'' by [[Honoré de Balzac]]
* ''[[Les Fleurs du mal]]'' by [[Charles Baudelaire]]
* ''[[Les Fleurs du mal]]'' by [[Charles Baudelaire]]
* ''[[Camera Lucida (book)|Camera Lucida]]'' by [[Roland Barthes]] and other works, such as ''[[Mythologies (book)|Mythologies]]'' and ''Mourning Diary''
* ''[[Camera Lucida (book)|Camera Lucida]]'' by [[Roland Barthes]] and other works, such as ''[[Mythologies (book)|Mythologies]]'' and ''Mourning Diary''
*''Force of Circumstance'' by [[Simone de Beauvoir]]
* ''Force of Circumstance'' by [[Simone de Beauvoir]]
* ''[[Nadja (novel)|Nadja]]'' by [[André Breton]]
* ''[[Nadja (novel)|Nadja]]'' by [[André Breton]]
*''Mobile'' by [[Michel Butor]] and other works
* ''Mobile'' by [[Michel Butor]] and other works, such as ''Degrees''
* ''Tricks'' by [[Renaud Camus]]
* ''[[A Happy Death]]'' by [[Albert Camus]]
* ''[[A Happy Death]]'' by [[Albert Camus]]
* ''[[The Trouble with Being Born (book)|The Trouble with Being Born]]'' by [[Emil Cioran]] and other works
* ''[[The Trouble with Being Born (book)|The Trouble with Being Born]]'' by [[Emil Cioran]] and other works, such as ''A Short History of Decay''
*''[[Proust and Signs]]'' by [[Gilles Deleuze]]
* ''Diary of a Genius'' by [[Salvador Dalí]]
* ''[[Proust and Signs]]'' by [[Gilles Deleuze]]
⚫
*''[[William Marshal, The Flower of Chivalry|William Marshal: The Flower of Chivalry]]'' by [[Georges Duby]]
* ''The Fire Within'' by [[Pierre Drieu La Rochelle]]
⚫
* ''[[William Marshal, The Flower of Chivalry|William Marshal: The Flower of Chivalry]]'' by [[Georges Duby]]
* ''[[Madness and Civilization]]'' by [[Michel Foucault]] and other works
* ''[[Madness and Civilization]]'' by [[Michel Foucault]] and other works
* ''When the World Spoke French'' by [[Marc Fumaroli]]
* ''The War Memoirs'' (''Unity'' and ''Salvation'') by [[Charles de Gaulle]]
* ''The War Memoirs'' (''Unity'' and ''Salvation'') by [[Charles de Gaulle]]
* ''[[The Immoralist]]'' by [[André Gide]] and other works
* ''[[The Immoralist]]'' by [[André Gide]] and other works
* ''Lying Woman'' by [[Jean Giraudoux]]
* ''Lying Woman'' by [[Jean Giraudoux]]
* ''[[The Opposing Shore]]'' by [[Julien Gracq]] and other works
* ''The Traitor'' by [[André Gorz]]
* ''[[The Opposing Shore]]'' by [[Julien Gracq]] and other works, such as ''[[Balcony in the Forest]]''
* ''[[Nedjma]]'' by [[Kateb Yacine]]
* ''[[Nedjma]]'' by [[Kateb Yacine]]
* ''The Rock Garden'' by [[Nikos Kazantzakis]]
* ''Manhood: A Journey from Childhood into the Fierce Order of Virility'' by [[Michel Leiris]]
* ''Manhood: A Journey from Childhood into the Fierce Order of Virility'' by [[Michel Leiris]]
* ''Like Death'' by [[Guy de Maupassant]] and other works, such as ''Alien Hearts''
* ''[[Serres chaudes|Hothouses]]'' by [[Maurice Maeterlinck]]
* ''[[Serres chaudes|Hothouses]]'' by [[Maurice Maeterlinck]]
* ''The Stars'' by [[Edgar Morin]]
* ''The Stars'' by [[Edgar Morin]]
* ''The History of Surrealism'' by [[Maurice Nadeau]]
* ''The History of Surrealism'' by [[Maurice Nadeau]]
* ''[[La Jalousie|Jealousy]]'' by [[Alain Robbe-Grillet]] and other works
* ''Swann's Way'' by [[Marcel Proust]]
*''Cupid’s Executioners'' by [[Hubert Monteilhet]] and other works
* ''[[La Jalousie|Jealousy]]'' by [[Alain Robbe-Grillet]] and other works, such as ''[[The Erasers]]'' and ''The Voyeur''
* ''Cupid’s Executioners'' by [[Hubert Monteilhet]] and other works
* ''La Guerre en Algérie'' by [[Jules Roy]]
* ''La Guerre en Algérie'' by [[Jules Roy]]
* ''[[The Little Prince]]'' by [[Antoine de Saint-Exupéry]]
* ''[[The Little Prince]]'' by [[Antoine de Saint-Exupéry]]
* ''[[Nausea (novel)|Nausea]]'' by [[Jean-Paul Sartre]]
* ''[[Nausea (novel)|Nausea]]'' by [[Jean-Paul Sartre]]
* ''The Flanders Road'' by [[Claude Simon]] and other works
* ''The Flanders Road'' by [[Claude Simon]] and other works, such as ''The Trolley'' and ''The Grass''
* ''[[The Charterhouse of Parma]]'' by [[Stendhal]]
* ''[[The Charterhouse of Parma]]'' by [[Stendhal]]
* ''[[The Conquest of America: The Question of the Other]]'' by [[Tzvetan Todorov]]
* ''[[Paris in the Twentieth Century]]'' by [[Jules Verne]]
* ''[[Paris in the Twentieth Century]]'' by [[Jules Verne]]

==References==
==References==
{{Reflist}}
{{Reflist}}
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[[Category:Jewish American poets]]
[[Category:Jewish American poets]]
[[Category:Poets Laureate of New York (state)]]
[[Category:Poets Laureate of New York (state)]]
[[Category:American LGBT poets]]
[[Category:American LGBTQ poets]]
[[Category:American gay writers]]
[[Category:American gay writers]]
[[Category:American literary critics]]
[[Category:American literary critics]]
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[[Category:Columbia College (New York) alumni]]
[[Category:Columbia College (New York) alumni]]
[[Category:University of Paris alumni]]
[[Category:University of Paris alumni]]
[[Category:LGBT Jews]]
[[Category:LGBTQ Jews]]
[[Category:LGBT people from Ohio]]
[[Category:LGBTQ people from Ohio]]
[[Category:20th-century American poets]]
[[Category:20th-century American poets]]
[[Category:21st-century American poets]]
[[Category:21st-century American poets]]
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[[Category:Writers from Cleveland]]
[[Category:Writers from Cleveland]]
[[Category:Poets from Ohio]]
[[Category:Poets from Ohio]]
[[Category:20th-century translators]]
[[Category:20th-century American translators]]
[[Category:20th-century American male writers]]
[[Category:20th-century American male writers]]
[[Category:21st-century American male writers]]
[[Category:21st-century American male writers]]

Latest revision as of 04:11, 8 November 2024

For other people named Richard Howard, see Richard Howard (disambiguation).

Richard Howard
BornRichard Joseph Howard
(1929-10-13)October 13, 1929
Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.
DiedMarch 31, 2022(2022-03-31) (aged 92)
New York City, New York, U.S.
EducationColumbia University (BA)
University of Paris
Notable awardsGuggenheim Fellowship (1966)
MacArthur Fellows Program (1996)
Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (1970)
National Book Award (1983)

Richard Joseph Howard (October 13, 1929 – March 31, 2022),[1] adopted as Richard Joseph Orwitz, was an American poet, literary critic, essayist, teacher, and translator. He was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and was a graduate of Columbia University, where he studied under Mark Van Doren,[2] and where he was an emeritus professor. He lived in New York City.

Life

[edit]

After reading French letters at the Sorbonne in 1952–53, Howard had a brief early career as a lexicographer. He soon turned his attention to poetry and poetic criticism, and won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry for his 1969 collection Untitled Subjects, which took for its subject dramatic imagined letters and monologues of 19th-century historical figures. For much of his career, Howard composed poems employing a quantitative verse technique.

A prolific literary critic, Howard's monumental 1969 volume Alone With America stretches to 594 pages[3] and profiles 41 American poets who had published at least two books each and "have come into a characteristic and—as I see it—consequential identity since the time, say, of the Korean War." Howard would later tell an interviewer

I wrote the book not for the sense of history, but for myself, knowing that a relation to one's moment was essential to getting beyond the moment. As I quoted Shaw in the book's preface, if you cannot believe in the greatness of your own age and inheritance, you will fall into confusion of mind and contrariety of spirit. The book was a rescuing anatomy of such belief, the construction of a credendum—articles of faith, or at least appreciation.[4]

He was awarded the PEN Translation Prize in 1976 for his translation of E. M. Cioran's A Short History of Decay and the National Book Award[5] for his 1983 translation of Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du mal. He was the longest-serving Poetry Editor of The Paris Review, from 1992 until 2005. He received a Pulitzer prize, the Academy of Arts and Letters Literary Award and a MacArthur Fellowship. In 1985, Howard received the PEN/Ralph Manheim Medal for Translation. A past Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, he was a Professor of Practice in the writing program at Columbia's School of the Arts. He was previously University Professor of English at the University of Houston and, before that, Ropes Professor of Comparative Literature at the University of Cincinnati. He served as Poet Laureate of the State of New York from 1993 to 1995.[6]

In 1982, Howard was named a Chevalier of L'Ordre National du Mérite by the government of France.

In 2016, he received the Philolexian Society Award for Distinguished Literary Achievement.

Howard died in New York City on March 31, 2022, from complications of dementia.

Personal life

[edit]

Richard Howard was born to poor Jewish parents. His last name at birth is unknown. He was adopted as an infant by Emma Joseph and Harry Orwitz, a middle-class Cleveland couple, who were also Jewish; his mother changed their last names to "Howard" when he was an infant after she divorced Orwitz. Howard never met his birth parents, nor his sister, who was adopted by another local family.[7] Howard was gay, a fact that comes up frequently in his later work.[8] He was out to some degree since at least the 1960s, when he remarked to friend W. H. Auden that he was offended by a fellow poet's use of Jewish and gay epithets, "since [he was] both these things", to which Auden replied, "My dear, I never knew you were Jewish!"[7]

Howard was renowned for the extreme number of books that he had collected over his lifetime and which famously lined the walls of his New York City apartment. Additionally, he kept on his bed, a large stuffed gorilla named "Mildred".[4]

Works

[edit]

Poetry

[edit]
  • Quantities (1962)
  • Damages (1967)
  • Untitled Subjects (1969)
  • Findings (1971)
  • Two-Part Inventions (1974)
  • Fellow Feelings (1976)
  • Misgivings (1979)
  • Lining Up (1984)
  • No Traveller (1989)
  • Selected Poems (1991)
  • Like Most Revelations (1994)
  • Trappings (1999)
  • Talking Cures (2002)
  • Fallacies of Wonder (2003)
  • Inner Voices (selected poems), 2004
  • The Silent Treatment (2005)
  • Without Saying (2008)
  • A Progressive Education (2014)
  • Richard Howard Loves Henry James and Other American Writers (2020)

Critical essays

[edit]
  • Alone With America: Essays on the Art of Poetry in the United States Since 1950 (1969)
  • Preferences: 51 American Poets Choose Poems From Their Own Work and From the Past (1974)
  • Travel Writing of Henry James (essay) (1994)
  • Paper Trail: Selected Prose 1965–2003 (2004)

Major translations (French to English)

[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ Richard Howard, Acclaimed Poet and Translator, Dies at 92 (subscription required)
  2. ^ "Mark Van Doren", Columbia 250 – Colombian Ahead of Their Times Columbia University.
  3. ^ Howard, Richard. Alone With America: Essays on the Art of Poetry in the United States Since 1950. New York: Atheneum, 1969.
  4. ^ a b Richard Howard, The Art of Poetry No. 86, The Paris Review, interview by J. D. McClatchy, Spring 2004
  5. ^ "National Book Awards – 1983". National Book Foundation. Retrieved 2012-03-10.
    There was a "Translation" award from 1966 to 1983.
  6. ^ "New York". US State Poets Laureate. Library of Congress. Retrieved May 8, 2012.
  7. ^ a b "Praising Sacred Places: Richard Howard's Jewish Roots", article by Benjamin Ivry in The Forward.
  8. ^ Official biography at Cleveland Arts Prize website
[edit]
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