Bidart, Frank

Bidart, Frank

▪ American poet
born 1939, California

      American poet whose introspective verse, notably dramatic monologues by troubled characters, deal with personal guilt, family life, and madness. His unconventional punctuation and typography give his colloquial and economical style an added emphasis.

      Bidart graduated from the University of California, Riverside, and later studied at Harvard University. His first volume of verse was Golden State (1973). It contains "Golden State," an autobiographical account of a father-and-son relationship, and "Herbert White," the lurid musings of a psychopathic pedophile. The Book of the Body (1977) features the dramatic monologues of an amputee and of a suicidal anorexic.

      Critical acclaim attended Bidart's publication of The Sacrifice (1983), a collection of five long poems about guilt, among them "The War of Vaslav Nijinsky," an ambitious mixture of poetry and prose about the dancer's obsession with the tragedies of World War I, and "Confessional," a psychiatric examination of a mother-and-son relationship. He followed the retrospective In the Western Night: Collected Poems 1965–90 (1990) with Desire (1997) and the chapbook Music Like Dirt (2002), both of which were finalists for the Pulitzer Prize. The poems of Music Like Dirt were later included in Star Dust (2005), which also features new material, including "The Third Hour of the Night," a monumental narrative that examines the act of creation through the eyes of Renaissance artist Benvenuto Cellini (Cellini, Benvenuto). Bidart also edited, with David Gewanter, the collected poems of Robert Lowell (Lowell, Robert, Jr.) (2003). In 2007 Bidart received a Bollingen Prize for lifetime achievement as a poet.

* * *


Universalium. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем решить контрольную работу

Look at other dictionaries:

  • Frank Bidart — (born 1939 in Bakersfield, California) is an American academic and award winning poet. In 1957, he began to study at the University of California at Riverside and went on to Harvard, where he was a student and friend of Robert Lowell and… …   Wikipedia

  • Robert Lowell — Infobox Writer name = Robert Traill Spence Lowell IV imagesize = caption = pseudonym = birthdate = March 1, 1917 birthplace = Boston, Massachusetts deathdate = September 12, 1977 deathplace = New York City, New York occupation = Poet nationality …   Wikipedia

  • literature — /lit euhr euh cheuhr, choor , li treuh /, n. 1. writings in which expression and form, in connection with ideas of permanent and universal interest, are characteristic or essential features, as poetry, novels, history, biography, and essays. 2.… …   Universalium

  • Calendar of 2000 — ▪ 2001 January We are fortunate to be alive at this moment in history. Never before has our nation enjoyed, at once, so much prosperity and social progress with so little internal crisis and so few external threats. Never before have we had such… …   Universalium

  • Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry — The Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry is awarded biennially by the Library of Congress on behalf of the nation in recognition for the most distinguished book of poetry written by an American and published during the preceding two… …   Wikipedia

  • Biarritz — 43° 28′ 54″ N 1° 33′ 22″ W / 43.4817, 1.55611111111 …   Wikipédia en Français

  • 2008 in poetry — yearbox2 in?=in poetry in2?=in literature cp=20th century c=21st century cf=22nd century yp1=2005 yp2=2006 yp3=2007 year=2008 ya1=2009 ya2=2010 ya3=2011 dp3=1970s dp2=1980s dp1=1990s d=2000s da=0 dn1=2010s dn2=2020s dn3=2030s|EventsWorks… …   Wikipedia

  • Myrrha — This article is about the Greek myth. For other uses, see Myrrha (disambiguation) …   Wikipedia

  • 2002 in poetry — yearbox2 in?=in poetry in2?=in literature cp=20th century c=21st century cf=22nd century yp1=1999 yp2=2000 yp3=2001 year=2002 ya1=2003 ya2=2004 ya3=2005 dp3=1970s dp2=1980s dp1=1990s d=2000s da=0 dn1=2010s dn2=2020s dn3=2030s|Events* March 16:… …   Wikipedia

  • 1998 in poetry — yearbox2 in?=in poetry in2?=in literature cp=19th century c=20th century cf=21st century yp1=1995 yp2=1996 yp3=1997 year=1998 ya1=1999 ya2=2000 ya3=2001 dp3=1960s dp2=1970s dp1=1980s d=1990s da=0 dn1=2000s dn2=2010s dn3=2020s|Events* Samizdat… …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”