David Kalstone (1933 – June 14, 1986) was an American

writer A writer is a person who uses written words in different writing styles and techniques to communicate ideas. Writers produce different forms of literary art and creative writing such as novels, short stories, books, poetry, travelogues, p ...

and literary critic.

Biography

Kalstone, born in McKeesport, Pennsylvania, was the recipient of a Fulbright Scholarship and studied at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world's third oldest surviving university and one of its most pr ...

. He taught 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 high ...

starting in 1959 and was a professor of English at

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College, and was ...

from 1967 until his death. An authority on the Elizabethan courtier poet

Sir Philip Sidney ''Sir'' is a formal honorific address in English for men, derived from Sire in the High Middle Ages. Both are derived from the old French "Sieur" (Lord), brought to England by the French-speaking Normans, and which now exist in French only as p ...

, Kalstone also lectured and wrote about 20th-century poets including

Elizabeth Bishop Elizabeth Bishop (February 8, 1911 – October 6, 1979) was an American poet and short-story writer. She was Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 1949 to 1950, the Pulitzer Prize winner for Poetry in 1956, the National Book Awar ...

and Robert Lowell. His close friends included the poet

James Merrill James Ingram Merrill (March 3, 1926 – February 6, 1995) was an American poet. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1977 for ''Divine Comedies.'' His poetry falls into two distinct bodies of work: the polished and formalist lyri ...

and the writer

Edmund White Edmund Valentine White III (born 1940) is an American novelist, memoirist, playwright, biographer and an essayist on literary and social topics. Since 1999 he has been a professor at Princeton University. France made him (and later ) de l'Ordr ...

, who is said to have modeled on Kalstone the character of Joshua in his 1997 novel, '' The Farewell Symphony''. Merrill wrote the introduction to ''Becoming a Poet'', a study of Elizabeth Bishop and the influence of

Marianne Moore Marianne Craig Moore (November 15, 1887 – February 5, 1972) was an American modernist poet, critic, translator, and editor. Her poetry is noted for formal innovation, precise diction, irony, and wit. Early life Moore was born in Kirkwood ...

and Robert Lowell in helping shape the younger poet's voice. Left incomplete at Kalstone's death due to AIDS, it was published (to considerable acclaim) in 1989.

Bibliography

*''Sidney's Poetry: Contexts and Interpretations'' (1965) *''Five Temperaments: Elizabeth Bishop, Robert Lowell, James Merrill, Adrienne Rich, John Ashbery'' (1977) *''Becoming a Poet: Elizabeth Bishop with Marianne Moore and Robert Lowell'' (1989)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kalstone, David People from McKeesport, Pennsylvania Writers from Pittsburgh American gay writers Harvard University faculty Rutgers University faculty 1933 births 1986 deaths Alumni of the University of Cambridge 20th-century American LGBT people