Michael Schmidt OBE

FRSL The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820, by King George IV, to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 600 Fellows, elec ...

(born 2 March 1947) is a Mexican-British

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or w ...

author An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states: "''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...

scholar A scholar is a person who pursues academic and intellectual activities, particularly academics who apply their intellectualism into expertise in an area of study. A scholar can also be an academic, who works as a professor, teacher, or researche ...

and

publisher Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, newsp ...

Early life

Born in

Mexico City Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital and largest city of Mexico, and the most populous city in North America. One of the world's alpha cities, it is located in the Valley o ...

, Mexico, Schmidt was educated at

The Hill School The Hill School (commonly known as The Hill) is a coeducational preparatory boarding school located on a campus in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, about northwest of Philadelphia. The Hill is part of the Ten Schools Admissions Organization (TSAO). ...

from 1959 to 1965 and earned an

English-Speaking Union The English-Speaking Union (ESU) is an international educational membership organistation. Founded by the journalist Sir Evelyn Wrench in 1918, it aims to bring together and empower people of different languages and cultures, by building skill ...

Scholarship to attend

Christ's Hospital School Christ's Hospital is a public school (English independent boarding school for pupils aged 11–18) with a royal charter located to the south of Horsham in West Sussex. The school was founded in 1552 and received its first royal charter in 1553. ...

(1965–66). He studied at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of highe ...

and at

Wadham College Wadham College () is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. It is located in the centre of Oxford, at the intersection of Broad Street and Parks Road. Wadham College was founded in 1610 by Dorothy W ...

Oxford University Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

Career

Schmidt was Professor of Poetry at

Glasgow University , image = UofG Coat of Arms.png , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of arms Flag , latin_name = Universitas Glasguensis , motto = la, Via, Veritas, Vita , ...

until 2014, the Writer in Residence at St. John's College, Cambridge from 2012 to 2015 and a visiting fellow at

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...

from 2017 to 2018. He is founder (1969) and editorial and managing director of

Carcanet Press Carcanet Press is a publisher, primarily of poetry, based in the United Kingdom and founded in 1969 by Michael Schmidt. In 2000 it was named the ''Sunday Times'' millennium Small Publisher of the Year. History ''Carcanet'' was originally a lit ...

and a founder (1973) and general editor of ''

PN Review Launched as ''Poetry Nation'', a twice-yearly hardback, in 1973, ''PN Review'' - now an A4 paperback - began quarterly publication in 1976 and has appeared six times a year since 1981 (PN Review 21). Two hundred and twenty-five issues of the magaz ...

''. A fellow of the

Royal Society of Literature The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820, by King George IV, to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 600 Fellows, ele ...

, Schmidt received an OBE in 2006 for services to poetry.Michael Schmidt, ''The Resurrection of the Body'', Smith/Doorstop Books, 2007. His literary career has been described as having "a strong sense of internationalism and cultural ‘connectedness’".''Contemporary Writers''
Schmidt refers to himself in his 1998 book ''Lives of the Poets'' as "an Anglophone Mexican publisher". Schmidt's 2014 book ''The Novel: A Biography'' is a loosely chronological history of the development of the novel. The book aims to explore the relationships between great novelists, including views by other novelists while avoiding literary critics who were not also writers. In August 2015, Schmidt was one of 20 authors of ''Poets for Corbyn'', an anthology of poems endorsing

Jeremy Corbyn Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (; born 26 May 1949) is a British politician who served as Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Labour Party from 2015 to 2020. On the political left of the Labour Party, Corbyn describes himself as a socialis ...

campaign Campaign or The Campaign may refer to: Types of campaigns * Campaign, in agriculture, the period during which sugar beets are harvested and processed *Advertising campaign, a series of advertisement messages that share a single idea and theme * Bl ...

in the Labour Party leadership election.

Selected bibliography

Poetry

*''It Was My Tree'' (Anvil, 1970) *''Bedlam and the Oak Wood'' (Carcanet, 1970) *''Desert of the Lions'' (Carcanet, 1972) *''My Brother Gloucester'' (Carcanet, 1976) *''A Change of Affairs'' (Anvil, 1978) *''The Love of Strangers'' – Poetry Book Society Special Commendation (Century Hutchinson, 1989) *''Selected Poems, 1972-1997'' – Poetry Book Society Special Commendation (Smith/Doorstop, 1997) *''The Resurrection of the Body'' (USA: Sheep Meadow; Smith/Doorstop, 2007) *''Collected Poems'' (Smith/Doorstop, 2009, Sheep Meadow Press, 2010) *''The Stories of My Life'' (Smith/Doorstop 2013)

Fiction

*''The Colonist'' - ''Los Angeles Times'' book award (Muller/Hutchinson, 1983; published in USA as ''Green Island'', Vanguard 1984, Dell, 1985) *''The Dresden Gate'' (Century Hutchinson, 1988; Vanguard, 1989)

Criticism

*''Reading Modern Poetry'' (London: Routledge, 1989) *''Lives of the Poets'' (Phoenix, 1998) *''The Story of Poetry: From

Cædmon Cædmon (; ''fl. c.'' 657 – 684) is the earliest English poet whose name is known. A Northumbrian cowherd who cared for the animals at the double monastery of Streonæshalch (now known as Whitby Abbey) during the abbacy of St. Hilda, he w ...

to Caxton; From Skelton to

Dryden '' John Dryden (; – ) was an English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who in 1668 was appointed England's first Poet Laureate. He is seen as dominating the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the per ...

; From

Pope The pope ( la, papa, from el, πάππας, translit=pappas, 'father'), also known as supreme pontiff ( or ), Roman pontiff () or sovereign pontiff, is the bishop of Rome (or historically the patriarch of Rome), head of the worldwide Cathol ...

to Burns'' (three volumes) (2001–2006) *''The First Poets: Lives of the Ancient Greek Poets'' (2004) *''The Novel: A Biography'' (Cambridge, MA:

Belknap Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is a publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University, and focused on academic publishing. It is a member of the Association of American University Presses. After the retir ...

, 2014) *''Gilgamesh: The Life of a Poem'' (Princeton, NJ:

Princeton University Press Princeton University Press is an independent publisher with close connections to Princeton University. Its mission is to disseminate scholarship within academia and society at large. The press was founded by Whitney Darrow, with the financial ...

, 2019)

Anthologies

* ''New Poetries I-VIII'' (Carcanet, 1994–2018) * ''Eleven British Poets'' (Methuen, 1980) *''The Harvill Book of Twentieth-Century Poetry in English'' (1999, 2005) (editor) *''A Calendar of Modern Poetry'' (PN Review 100, 1994) *''The Great Modern Poets''(inc audio excerpts) Quercus Poetry, 2006,

References

External links

*
Biography on Carcanet Press''Profile on ''Contemporary Writers''
��Schmidt's Lecture from StAnza, Scotland's annual poetry festival
Podcast Interview with Schmidt by André Naffis-Sahely''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Schmidt, Michael Living people 1947 births American male poets Officers of the Order of the British Empire Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature Harvard University alumni The Hill School alumni Writers from Mexico City 20th-century American poets 20th-century American male writers