Poet Richard Wilbur to Give Reading at Yale

Richard Wilbur Richard Wilbur, a preeminent voice of post-World War II American poetry and the nation’s second Poet Laureate, will read from his work at Yale on December 3.
Richard Wilbur

Richard Wilbur, a preeminent voice of post-World War II American poetry and the nation’s second Poet Laureate, will read from his work at Yale on December 3.

Free and open to the public, the reading will take place in St. Anthony Hall, 483 College St., at 7 p.m.

One of the most decorated poets in the English language, Wilbur was educated at Amherst and Harvard, where he maintained a close relationship with the considerably older Robert Frost. The poet burst on the literary scene in 1947 at the age of 26 with a critically acclaimed volume of verse “The Beautiful Changes.” His subsequent volumes—most notably “Things of This World” (1956) which won both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award—established him as a poet of immense formal skill and emotional range.

Of his poetry, Babette Deutsch in The New York Times Book Review wrote, “Here is poetry to be read with the eye, the ear, the heart and the mind.” Such praise applies equally to his work in other languages and mediums—Wilbur’s translations of French and Italian verse and drama, and particularly his work with Molière, stand among the greatest achievements in the field; his lyrics for “Candide,” the musical by Leonard Bernstein and Lillian Hellman, are among his remarkable forays into contemporary theater. For nearly 30 years, until 1986, Wilbur taught at Wesleyan University, all the while becoming one of the most decorated poets in the English language. He is the only poet to have won the Pulitzer twice, the second time in 1989 for his “New and Collected Poems,” and has also won the Bollingen Prize, the Edna St. Vincent Millay Award and the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. Following Robert Penn Warren, Wilbur served in 1987 as the Poet Laureate of the United States.

This event is sponsored by the John Christophe Schlesinger Visiting Writer Fund and Jonathan Edwards College.



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Media Contact

Dorie Baker: dorie.baker@yale.edu, 203-432-1345