Stephen Elliot Dunn (June 24, 1939June 24, 2021) was an American

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 writte ...

and educator who authored twenty-one collections of poetry. He won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his 2001 collection, ''Different Hours,'' and received an Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He also won three National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowships,

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

, and Rockefeller Foundations Fellowship.

Early life

Dunn was born in

Forest Hills, Queens Forest Hills is a mostly residential neighborhood in the central portion of the borough of Queens in New York City. It is adjacent to Corona to the north, Rego Park and Glendale to the west, Forest Park to the south, Kew Gardens to the southeast, ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

on June 24, 1939. His parents were Ellen (Fleishman) and Charles Dunn. He attended Forest Hills High School, where he played basketball. After graduating in 1957, he studied history at

Hofstra University Hofstra University is a private university in Hempstead, New York. It is Long Island's largest private university. Hofstra originated in 1935 as an extension of New York University (NYU) under the name Nassau College – Hofstra Memorial of Ne ...

. He played

guard Guard or guards may refer to: Professional occupations * Bodyguard, who protects an individual from personal assault * Crossing guard, who stops traffic so pedestrians can cross the street * Lifeguard, who rescues people from drowning * Prison ...

for its

basketball team Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

and was part of the squad that had a 23–1 record during the 1959–60 season. He was nicknamed "Radar" for his ability to make jump shots. Dunn graduated from

in 1962 and went on to play one season for the

Williamsport Billies Williamsport is a place name that may refer to the following places in the United States: *Williamsport, Arizona a ghost town and former steamboat landing on the Colorado River. *Williamsport, Indiana *Williamsport, Maryland *Williamsport, Michigan ...

of the

Eastern Basketball Association The Continental Basketball Association (CBA) (originally known as the Eastern Pennsylvania Basketball League, and later as the Eastern Professional Basketball League and the Eastern Basketball Association) was a men's professional basketball m ...

. He then worked in advertising until he was 26, when he traveled to Spain to pen a novel, which he ended up discarding. He subsequently undertook postgraduate studies at

Syracuse University Syracuse University (informally 'Cuse or SU) is a Private university, private research university in Syracuse, New York. Established in 1870 with roots in the Methodist Episcopal Church, the university has been nonsectarian since 1920. Locate ...

, obtaining a

master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is an academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice.

in creative writing in 1970.

Career

Dunn began teaching at Stockton University in 1974 and published his first full-length collection entitled ''Looking for Holes in the Ceiling'' that same year. He continued working at Stockton for approximately three decades, and also taught at Wichita State University,

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW, simply Washington, or informally U-Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1861, Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast; it was established in Seattle a ...

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 ...

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

, and

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

. A collection of essays about Dunn's poetry was published in 2013. He finished his last book, ''The Not Yet Fallen World'', shortly before his death. It is scheduled to be published in May 2022, and was viewed by Dunn as the best work he had written.

Personal life

Dunn married his first wife, Lois Kelly, in 1964. Together, they had two children: Susanne and Andrea. They divorced in 2001. He married Barbara Hurd the following year. Dunn had earlier lived in Port Republic, New Jersey. He later resided at homes in Ocean City, New Jersey, as well as Hurd's hometown of Frostburg, Maryland.Strauss, Robert
"Ode to Joi(sey)"
''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', April 27, 2003. Accessed October 9, 2007. "Mr. Dunn, who used to live in Port Republic, a remote town in the interior of South Jersey, now divides his time between Ocean City and his wife's hometown, Frostburg, Md." He died on the night of his 82nd birthday at his home in Frostburg. He suffered from Parkinson’s disease prior to his death.

Selected bibliography

Poetry

Collections

* * *''Full of Lust and Good Usage'', Carnegie-Mellon University Press (Pittsburgh, PA), 1976. *''A Circus of Needs'', Carnegie-Mellon University Press (Pittsburgh, PA), 1978. *''Work and Love'', Carnegie-Mellon University Press (Pittsburgh, PA), 1981. *''Not Dancing'', Carnegie-Mellon University Press (Pittsburgh, PA), 1984. *''Local Time'', Quill/Morrow (New York, NY), 1986. *''Between Angels: Poems'', W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 1989. *''Landscape at the End of the Century: Poems'', W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 1991. *''New and Selected Poems: 1974-1994'', W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 1994. *''Loosestrife: Poems'', W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 1996. *''Riffs & Reciprocities: Prose Pairs'', W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 1998.
''Different Hours''
W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 2000. *''The Insistence of Beauty: Poems'', W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 2004. *''Local Visitations: Poems'', Norton, 2004, *''Everything Else in the World'', W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 2006. *''What Goes On: Selected and New Poems 1995-2009'', W. W. Norton (New York, NY), 2009.
''Here and Now: Poems''
W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 2011. *''Lines of Defense'', W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 2014. *''Whereas: Poems'', W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 2017. *''Pagan Virtues: Poems'', W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 2019. ISBN 978-1324002314 *''The Not Yet Fallen World: New and Selected Poems.'' W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY), 2022. ISBN 978-0-393-88225-4.

Selected list of poems

Non fiction

''Walking Light: Memoirs and Essays on Poetry''
BOA Editions, Ltd., 2001.
''Degrees of Fidelity: Essays on Poetry and the Latitudes of the Personal''
Tiger Bark Press, 2018.

References

External links

Author interview for Guernica Magazine (Guernicamag.com)Article on Dunn winning the 2001 Pulitzer PrizeStephen Dunn biography
* Audio
Stephen Dunn reads "Talk to God"
from the book ''What Goes On'' (vi
poemsoutloud.net
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dunn, Stephen 1939 births 2021 deaths American male poets Columbia University faculty Neurological disease deaths in Maryland Deaths from Parkinson's disease Hofstra University alumni People from Frostburg, Maryland People from Atlantic County, New Jersey Pulitzer Prize for Poetry winners Stockton University faculty Syracuse University College of Arts and Sciences alumni University of Michigan faculty People from Ocean City, New Jersey The New Yorker people Williamsport Billies (basketball) players Hofstra Pride men's basketball players