William Simone Di Piero is an American poet, translator, essayist, and educator. He has published ten collections of poetry and five collections of essays in addition to his translations. In 2012 Di Piero received the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize for his lifetime achievement; in making the award, Christian Wiman noted, "He’s a great poet whose work is just beginning to get the wide audience it deserves."

Life

He grew up in an Italian working-class neighborhood, attended St. Joseph's College in Philadelphia and received a master's degree from San Francisco State University in 1971. He taught at Louisiana State University, and Northwestern University. In 1982, he joined

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 ...

. He is an art critic, and curated a photography exhibit of Jonathan Elderfield. His work appeared in '' AGNI'', '' Ploughshares'', and '' Triquarterly''. He lives in San Francisco.

Awards

* 2012 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize for lifetime achievement. * 2008

California Book Award The Commonwealth Club of California is a non-profit, non-partisan educational organization based in Northern California. Founded in 1903, it is the oldest and largest public affairs forum in the United States. Membership is open to everyone. Ac ...

. Gold medal for ''Chinese Apples: New and Selected Poems''. * 1998–2001 Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Fund grant.Award and dates verified using the searchable database at * 1996 Academy of American Poets Raiziss/de Palchi Translation Award. Book prize for ''This Strange Joy: Selected Poems of Sandro Penna''. * 1985

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 ...

. * Ingram Merrill Fellowship. * National Endowment for the Arts grant.

Works

Poetry collections

* ''The Complaints''. Carnegie Mellon University Press; February 15, 2019 * ''The Man on the Water''. MadHat Press; December 15, 2016 * * * * * * * * * * * ''Country of Survivors: Poems''. Eric B. Rasmussen Publishing. 1974.

Journal contributions

* * * * * * *

Translations

* * * *

Essays

* ''Fat: New and Uncollected Prose''. Carnegie Mellon University Press; November 7, 2020 *''City Dog'', Northwestern University Press, 2009. * * * * *

Anthologies

* *

References

Online poetry

* * Links to several poems and articles by Di Piero. {{DEFAULTSORT:Di Piero, W. S. 1945 births Living people American male poets Writers from Philadelphia Greek–English translators Italian–English translators 20th-century American poets 20th-century American translators 20th-century American male writers 20th-century American essayists 21st-century American poets 21st-century American translators 21st-century American male writers 21st-century American essayists American male essayists Saint Joseph's University alumni San Francisco State University alumni Louisiana State University faculty Northwestern University faculty Stanford University faculty