Catherine Davis (1924–2002) was an
American poet. Born in
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minneapolis () is the largest city in Minnesota, United States, and the county seat of Hennepin County. The city is abundant in water, with thirteen lakes, wetlands, the Mississippi River, creeks and waterfalls. Minneapolis has its origins ...
,
she studied poetry with
J. V. Cunningham
James Vincent Cunningham (August 23, 1911 – March 30, 1985) was an American poet, literary critic and teacher.
Background
Cunningham is described as a neo-classicist or anti-modernist. His poetry was distinguished by its clarity, brevity and ...
at the
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...
, and, at
Stanford University
Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...
, with
Yvor Winters
Arthur Yvor Winters (October 17, 1900 – January 25, 1968) was an American poet and literary critic.
Life
Winters was born in Chicago, Illinois and lived there until 1919 except for brief stays in Seattle and in Pasadena, where his grandparen ...
, graduating in 1951.
Davis received her bachelor's degree from
George Washington University
, mottoeng = "God is Our Trust"
, established =
, type = Private federally chartered research university
, academic_affiliations =
, endowment = $2.8 billion (2022)
, preside ...
in 1961, at the age of 37, and subsequently joined the
University of Iowa's prestigious
creative writing program.
[ The poet Donald Justice, whom she met while at ]Iowa
Iowa () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States, bordered by the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west. It is bordered by six states: Wisconsin to the northeast, Illinois to the ...
, was a lifelong champion of her work.[ ]UCLA
The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California St ...
poet Edgar Bowers
Edgar Bowers (; March 2, 1924 – February 4, 2000) was an American poet who won the Bollingen Prize in Poetry in 1989."E ...
compared her work favorably to that of Dorothy Parker
Dorothy Parker (née Rothschild; August 22, 1893 – June 7, 1967) was an American poet, writer, critic, and satirist based in New York; she was known for her wit, wisecracks, and eye for 20th-century urban foibles.
From a conflicted and unhap ...
.[ Davis held the ]Stegner Fellowship
The Stegner Fellowship program is a two-year creative writing fellowship at Stanford University. The award is named after American Wallace Stegner (1909–1993), a historian, novelist, short story writer, environmentalist, and Stanford faculty mem ...
in Creative Writing at Stanford.Alzheimer's disease
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegeneration, neurodegenerative disease that usually starts slowly and progressively worsens. It is the cause of 60–70% of cases of dementia. The most common early symptom is difficulty in short-term me ...
. She died intestate, leaving the copyrights to her works in limbo.[
]
Publications
Davis published four works:[
* ''The Leaves: Lyrics and Epigrams'' (Bembo Press, 1960)
* ''Second Beginnings & Other Poems'' (The King’s Quair Press, 1961)
* ''Under This Lintel'' (King’s Quair Press, 1962)
* ''Looking In and Looking Out'' (R. L. Barth,1999).
]
References
External links
Stanford Magazine article on Catherine Davis
1924 births
2002 deaths
Stanford University alumni
American women poets
20th-century American poets
20th-century American women writers
University of Chicago alumni
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