Linda Alouise Gregg (September 9, 1942 – March 20, 2019) was an

American poet The poets listed below were either born in the United States or else published much of their poetry while living in that country. A B C D E F G H I–J K L M N O P Q * George Quasha (born 1942) R S T U–V ...

Biography

She was born in Suffern, New York. Ms. Gregg grew up on the other side of the country, in Marin County,

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

. She received both her

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four year ...

, in 1967, and her

Master of Arts A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Th ...

, in 1972, from

San Francisco State College San Francisco State University (commonly referred to as San Francisco State, SF State and SFSU) is a public research university in San Francisco. As part of the 23-campus California State University system, the university offers 118 different b ...

. Her first book of poems, ''Too Bright to See'', was published in 1981. She was in a long relationship with poet

Jack Gilbert Jack Gilbert (February 18, 1925 – November 13, 2012) was an American poet. Gilbert was acquainted with Jack Spicer and Allen Ginsberg, both prominent figureheads of the Beat Movement, but is not considered a Beat Poet; he described himself as ...

, and later married writer, political activist, and philosophy professor John Brentlinger. The couple divorced in 1990. She was then in a relationship with an unnamed married man for an unspecified time. Her published books include ''Things and Flesh'', ''Chosen By The Lion'', ''The Sacraments of Desire'', ''Alma'', ''Too Bright to See'', ''In the Middle Distance'', and ''All of it Singing''. Her poems also appeared in numerous

literary magazines A literary magazine is a periodical devoted to literature in a broad sense. Literary magazines usually publish short stories, poetry, and essays, along with literary criticism, book reviews, biographical profiles of authors, interviews and letter ...

, including ''

Ploughshares ''Ploughshares'' is an American literary journal established in 1971 by DeWitt Henry and Peter O'Malley in The Plough and Stars, an Irish pub in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Since 1989, ''Ploughshares'' has been based at Emerson College in Bos ...

'', ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

'', the ''

Paris Review ''The Paris Review'' is a quarterly English-language literary magazine established in Paris in 1953 by Harold L. Humes, Peter Matthiessen, and George Plimpton. In its first five years, ''The Paris Review'' published works by Jack Kerouac, Phil ...

'', the ''

Kenyon Review ''The Kenyon Review'' is a literary magazine based in Gambier, Ohio, US, home of Kenyon College. ''The Review'' was founded in 1939 by John Crowe Ransom, critic and professor of English at Kenyon College, who served as its editor until 1959. ' ...

'', and the '' Atlantic Monthly''. She began teaching poetry at such schools as Indian Valley Colleges, University of Arizona, Napa State, and

Louisiana State University Louisiana State University (officially Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College, commonly referred to as LSU) is a public land-grant research university in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The university was founded in 1860 nea ...

. She later taught at the

University of Iowa The University of Iowa (UI, U of I, UIowa, or simply Iowa) is a public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is organized into 12 col ...

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

, the

University of California at Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant uni ...

, the

University of Houston The University of Houston (UH) is a public research university in Houston, Texas. Founded in 1927, UH is a member of the University of Houston System and the university in Texas with over 47,000 students. Its campus, which is primarily in s ...

, and the

University of North Carolina at Greensboro The University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG or UNC Greensboro) is a public research university in Greensboro, North Carolina. It is part of the University of North Carolina system. UNCG, like all members of the UNC system, is a stand- ...

. Starting in 2006, she lived in New York City's East Village, and for two years was a Lecturer in the Creative Writing Program in the University Center for the Creative and Performing Arts at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

. On March 20, 2019, she died of cancer at the Beth Israel Hospital in New York City.

Awards

* 1982 Guggenheim Fellowship * 1985 Whiting Award * 1993

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 ...

grant * 2003 Sara Teasdale Award * 2003 Lannan Literary Foundation Fellowship * 2006 PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry * 2009 Jackson Poetry Prize (awarded by Poets & Writers) * multiple Pushcart Prizes

Her work

"Linda Gregg brings us back to poetry. . . . She is original and mysterious, one of the best poets in America", says

Gerald Stern Gerald Daniel Stern (February 22, 1925 – October 27, 2022) was an American poet, essayist, and educator. The author of twenty collections of poetry and four books of essays, he taught literature and creative writing at Temple University, Indi ...

. Much of Linda Gregg's poetry is inspired by her extensive travels. Her work has received enormous critical praise for its soaring lyrical depictions of grief and loss, and the strange strengths and beauty she mines from them. Joseph Brodsky once stated that " e blinding intensity of Ms. Gregg's lines stains the reader's psyche the way lightning or heartbreak do." The poet

Czesław Miłosz Czesław Miłosz (, also , ; 30 June 1911 – 14 August 2004) was a Polish-American poet, prose writer, translator, and diplomat. Regarded as one of the great poets of the 20th century, he won the 1980 Nobel Prize in Literature. In its citation, ...

said, "I consider Linda Gregg to be one of the best American poets, and I value the neatness of design in her poems, as well as the energy of each line."

W. S. Merwin William Stanley Merwin (September 30, 1927 – March 15, 2019) was an American poet who wrote more than fifty books of poetry and prose, and produced many works in translation. During the 1960s anti-war movement, Merwin's unique craft was thema ...

confessed: :"I have loved Linda Gregg's poems since I first read them. They are original in the way that really matters: they speak clearly of their source. They are inseparable from the surprising, unrolling, eventful, pure current of their language, and they convey at once the pain of individual loss, a steady and utterly personal radiance."

Works

*''Too bright to see : poems'', Port Townsend, Wash. : Graywolf Press, 1981. , *''Alma'', New York : Random House, 1985. , *''The Sacraments of Desire'', Saint Paul, Minn. : Graywolf Press, 1991. , *''Chosen by the lion : poems'', St. Paul, MN : Graywolf Press, 1995. , *''Things and flesh : poems'', Saint Paul, Minn. : Graywolf Press, 1999. , *''Too bright to see ; & Alma'' : poems, Saint Paul, Minn. : Graywolf Press, 2002. , *''In the middle distance : poems'', Saint Paul, Minn. : Graywolf Press, 2006. , *''All of it singing : new and selected poems'', Saint Paul, Minnesota : Graywolf Press, 2008. ,

Biography

Awards

Her work

Works

References

External links