Dean Young (born 1955; died 23 August 2022) was a contemporary American poet in the poetic lineage of

John Ashbery John Lawrence Ashbery (July 28, 1927 – September 3, 2017) was an American poet and art critic. Ashbery is considered the most influential American poet of his time. Oxford University literary critic John Bayley wrote that Ashbery "sounded, in ...

Frank O'Hara Francis Russell "Frank" O'Hara (March 27, 1926 – July 25, 1966) was an American writer, poet, and art critic. A curator at the Museum of Modern Art, O'Hara became prominent in New York City's art world. O'Hara is regarded as a leading figure i ...

, and

Kenneth Koch Kenneth Koch ( ; 27 February 1925 – 6 July 2002) was an American poet, playwright, and professor, active from the 1950s until his death at age 77. He was a prominent poet of the New York School of poetry. This was a loose group of poets includ ...

. Often cited as a second-generation New York School poet, Young also derived influence and inspiration from the work of

André Breton André Robert Breton (; 19 February 1896 – 28 September 1966) was a French writer and poet, the co-founder, leader, and principal theorist of surrealism. His writings include the first ''Surrealist Manifesto'' (''Manifeste du surréalisme'') o ...

Paul Éluard Paul Éluard (), born Eugène Émile Paul Grindel (; 14 December 1895 – 18 November 1952), was a French poet and one of the founders of the Surrealist movement. In 1916, he chose the name Paul Éluard, a matronymic borrowed from his maternal ...

, and the other French Surrealist poets.

Life

He was born in

Columbia, Pennsylvania Columbia, formerly Wright's Ferry, is a borough (town) in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, United States. As of the 2020 census, it had a population of 10,222. It is southeast of Harrisburg, on the east (left) bank of the Susquehanna River, ac ...

. He received his MFA from Indiana University. In 2008, Young became the William Livingston Chair of Poetry of the Michener Center for Writers at the University of Texas at Austin. His most recent books are ''Bender: New and Selected Poems'', ''Fall Higher'' and ''The Art of Recklessness''. In an interview, Young said his poems are about misunderstanding and that tying meaning too closely with understanding is not the intent of his poetry. He finds the process of creation to be more important than the work itself: his poems are more demonstrations than explanations. He also finds that using mangled quotes from technical journals, as he experimented with in ''First Course in Turbulence'', allows for a kind of collage in which tones confront each other. Citing

Breton Breton most often refers to: *anything associated with Brittany, and generally ** Breton people ** Breton language, a Southwestern Brittonic Celtic language of the Indo-European language family, spoken in Brittany ** Breton (horse), a breed **Ga ...

as an influence, Young finds

Surrealism Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to l ...

useful in understanding the imagination and removing the boundaries between real and unreal. In 2011, Young had a heart transplant. The possibility of his death and encounters with impermanence are frequent themes in his poetry, especially in ''Fall Higher'', which was published days after his transplant. Young died due to complications from COVID-19 on August 23rd, 2022 at

Good Samaritan Hospital Good Samaritan Hospital or Good Samaritan Medical Center may refer to: India *Good Samaritan Hospital (Panamattom), Koprakalam, Panamattom, Kerala *Good Samaritan Centre, Mutholath Nagar, Cherpunkal, Kottyam, Kerala United States *Banner - Univer ...

in Cincinnati, Ohio. He was 67 years old.

Awards

He was awarded the Colorado Prize for Poetry for ''Strike Anywhere'', has received a

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 ...

from

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 ...

, and has been awarded fellowships by the

John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation The John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation was founded in 1925 by Olga and Simon Guggenheim in memory of their son, who died on April 26, 1922. The organization awards Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been ...

(2002) as well as from the

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 federal ...

and the

Fine Arts Work Center The Fine Arts Work Center is a non-profit enterprise devoted to encouraging the growth and development of emerging visual artists and writers through residency programs, to the propagation of aesthetic values and experience, and to the restoratio ...

Provincetown, Massachusetts Provincetown is a New England town located at the extreme tip of Cape Cod in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, in the United States. A small coastal resort town with a year-round population of 3,664 as of the 2020 United States Census, Provincet ...

. His work has been included in ''The Best American Poetry'' anthology multiple times, dating back to 1993. ''Elegy on Toy Piano'' (2005), was a finalist for the

Pulitzer Prize for Poetry The Pulitzer Prize for Poetry is one of the seven American Pulitzer Prizes awarded annually for Letters, Drama, and Music. It was first presented in 1922, and is given for a distinguished volume of original verse by an American author, published ...

. Dean was the Poet Laureate for Texas in 2014.

Bibliography

Collections

*
''Beloved Infidel''
(1992) Originally published by

Wesleyan University Press Wesleyan University Press is a university press that is part of Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut. The press is currently directed by Suzanna Tamminen, a published poet and essayist. History and overview Founded (in its present for ...

. *''Strike Anywhere'' (1995) *''First Course in Turbulence'' (1999) *''Skid'' (2002) *''Ready-Made Bouquet'' (Published by Stride, , 2005) *''Elegy on Toy Piano'' (2005) *''Embryoyo'' (2007) *''Primitive Mentor'' (2008) (shortlisted for the 2009 International

Griffin Poetry Prize The Griffin Poetry Prize is Canada's most generous poetry award. It was founded in 2000 by businessman and philanthropist Scott Griffin. Before 2022, the awards went to one Canadian and one international poet who writes in the English language. ...

) *''7 Poets, 4 Days, 1 Book'' ( Trinity University Press, 2009) *''31 Poems, 1988-2008'' (published by Forklift, Ink, 2009) *''The Foggist'' (2009) *''The Art of Recklessness'' (2010) *''Fall Higher'' (

Copper Canyon Press Copper Canyon Press is an independent, non-profit small press, founded in 1972 specializing exclusively in the publication of poetry. It is located in Port Townsend, Washington. Copper Canyon Press publishes new collections of poetry by both popu ...

, 2011) *''Bender: New and Selected Poems'' (

, 2012) *''Shock by Shock'' (

, 2015) *''Solar Perplexus'' (

, 2019)

List of poems

PoemHunter.com
- Some poems by Dean Young.
Ode to Hangover
- text and audio file of Young reading the poem aloud.
Poem Without Forgiveness
from the Paris Review

poem by Dean Young

from Jacket Magazine
Exit Ovidian
poem from Boston Review

poem from Pool Magazine
Acceptance Speech
from Poetry Magazine
Bronzed
from Poetry Magazine

References

External links

Griffin Poetry Prize biography, including video clip of reading of Dean Young poemPoets.org
- A brief biography.

- A very brief biography with links to several poems.
Dean Young on Poemist
- A brief information and list of poems.

- Dean Young needs a heart transplant (donate) * Dean Young's poe
"Light-Bringers" in ''Gulf Coast: A Journal of Literature and Fine Arts'' (25.1)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Young, Dean Poets from Pennsylvania 1955 births Living people American male poets Surrealist poets National Endowment for the Arts Fellows People from Columbia, Pennsylvania 20th-century American poets 21st-century American poets