Edward Field (born June 7, 1924) is an American poet and author.

Biography

Field was born in

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

, New York City, to a family of Ashkenazi immigrants. He grew up in Lynbrook, Long Island, New York, and, being Jewish, he and his family faced antisemitism and discrimination. He played cello in the Field Family Trio, which had a weekly radio program on WGBB Freeport. He served in

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

in the

8th Air Force The Eighth Air Force (Air Forces Strategic) is a numbered air force (NAF) of the United States Air Force's Air Force Global Strike Command (AFGSC). It is headquartered at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana. The command serves as Air Forces ...

in England and France, as a navigator in heavy bombers, and flew 25 missions over Germany. In February 1945 he took part in a raid on Berlin with his

B-17 The Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress is a four-engined heavy bomber developed in the 1930s for the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC). Relatively fast and high-flying for a bomber of its era, the B-17 was used primarily in the European Theater ...

. His bomber was crippled by flak and crash-landed in the

North Sea The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Norway, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. An epeiric sea, epeiric sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the ...

. All ten crew members made it into the plane’s life rafts, but only seven of them managed to resist till the moment they were rescued by a British air-sea boat hours later. He began writing poetry during World War II, after a Red Cross worker handed him an anthology of poetry. In 1963 his book ''Stand Up, Friend, With Me'' was awarded the prestigious

Lamont Poetry Prize The Academy of American Poets is a national, member-supported organization that promotes poets and the art of poetry. The nonprofit organization was incorporated in the state of New York in 1934. It fosters the readership of poetry through outreach ...

and was published. In 1992, he received a

Lambda Award Lambda Literary Awards, also known as the "Lammys", are awarded yearly by Lambda Literary to recognize the crucial role LGBTQ writers play in shaping the world. The Lammys celebrate the very best in LGBTQ literature.The awards were instituted i ...

for ''Counting Myself Lucky, Selected Poems 1963–1992''. Other honors include the

Shelley Memorial Award The Shelley Memorial Award of the Poetry Society of America, was established by the will of Mary P. Sears, and named after the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley. The prize is given to a living American poet selected with reference to genius and need, and is ...

, a

Rome Prize The Rome Prize is awarded by the American Academy in Rome, in Rome, Italy. Approximately thirty scholars and artists are selected each year to receive a study fellowship at the academy. Prizes have been awarded annually since 1921, with a hiatus ...

, and an

Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...

for the documentary film '' To Be Alive'', for which he wrote the narration. He received the

Bill Whitehead Award The Bill Whitehead Award is an annual literary award, presented by Publishing Triangle to honour lifetime achievement by writers within the LGBT community. First presented in 1989, the award was named in honour of Bill Whitehead, an editor with ...

for Lifetime Achievement from

Publishing Triangle The Publishing Triangle, founded in 1988 by Robin Hardy, is an American association of gay men and lesbians in the publishing industry. They sponsor an annual National Lesbian and Gay Book Month, and have sponsored the annual Triangle Awards pro ...

in 2005. In 1979, he edited the anthology ''A Geography of Poets'', and in 1992, with Gerald Locklin and Charles Stetler, brought out a sequel, ''A New Geography of Poets''. He and his partner Neil Derrick (1931–2018), long-time residents of Greenwich Village, wrote a best-selling historical novel about the Village, ''The Villagers''. They were both artists in residence at

Westbeth Artists Community Westbeth Artists Housing is a nonprofit housing and commercial complex dedicated to providing affordable living and working space for artists and arts organizations in New York City. The complex comprises the full city block bounded by West, Be ...

since 1972. Derrick died on January 5, 2018. As of 2018, Field continued to reside at Westbeth. Field's narrative poem "World War II" is part of "Poets of World War II" anthology, published by the

Library of America The Library of America (LOA) is a nonprofit publisher of classic American literature. Founded in 1979 with seed money from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Ford Foundation, the LOA has published over 300 volumes by authors rang ...

and edited by Harvey Shapiro. In 2005 the University of Wisconsin Press published his literary memoirs ''The Man Who Would Marry Susan Sontag and Other Intimate Literary Portraits of the Bohemian Era'', the title of which refers to the writer Alfred Chester. His most recent book ''After the Fall: Poems Old and New'' was published by the University of Pittsburgh Press in 2007. British editor

Diana Athill Diana Athill (21 December 1917 – 23 January 2019) was a British literary editor, novelist and memoirist who worked with some of the greatest writers of the 20th century at the London-based publishing company Andre Deutsch Ltd. Early life ...

's ''Instead of a Book: Letters to a Friend'' (

Granta Books ''Granta'' is a literary magazine and publisher in the United Kingdom whose mission centres on its "belief in the power and urgency of the story, both in fiction and non-fiction, and the story’s supreme ability to describe, illuminate and m ...

, 2011) is a collection of letters from her to Field chronicling their intimate correspondence spanning more than 30 years. In 2019, Field's niece Diane Weishe produced the animated film "Minor Accident of War", inspired by his memories of survival during the World War II. Designed by Piotr Kabat, the film is narrated by Field.New animated film honors Edward Field, WWII veteran and a hero on several fronts
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Books

Poetry

* ''Icarus'' (1963) * ''Stand Up, Friend, With Me'' ( Grove Press, 1963) * ''Variety Photoplays'' (Grove Press, 1967) * ''Eskimo Songs and Stories'' (

Delacorte Press Dell Publishing Company, Inc. is an American publisher of books, magazines and comic books, that was founded in 1921 by George T. Delacorte Jr. with $10,000 (approx. $145,000 in 2021), two employees and one magazine title, ''I Confess'', and so ...

, 1973) * ''A Full Heart'' (Sheep Meadow Press, 1977) * ''Stars in My Eyes'' (Sheep Meadow Press, 1978) * ''The Lost, Dancing'' (Watershed Tapes, 1984) * ''New And Selected Poems'' (Sheep Meadow Press, 1987) * ''Counting Myself Lucky, Selected Poems 1963–1992'' (Black Sparrow, 1992) * ''A Frieze for a Temple of Love'' (

Black Sparrow Books Black Sparrow Press is a New England based independent book publisher, known for literary fiction and poetry. History Black Sparrow was founded in Los Angeles, California, in 1966 by John Martin in order to publish the works of Charles Bukowski ...

, 1998) * ''Magic Words'' (

Harcourt Brace Harcourt () was an American publishing firm with a long history of publishing fiction and nonfiction for adults and children. The company was last based in San Diego, California, with editorial/sales/marketing/rights offices in New York City a ...

, 1998) * ''After The Fall: Poems Old and New'' (

University of Pittsburgh Press The University of Pittsburgh Press is a scholarly publishing house and a major American university press, part of the University of Pittsburgh. The university and the press are located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the United States. The press ...

, 2007)

Fiction (with Neil Derrick)

* ''The Potency Clinic'' (Bleecker Street Press, 1978) * ''Die PotenzKlinik'' (Berlin: Albino Verlag, 1982) * ''Village'' (

Avon Books Avon Publications is one of the leading publishers of romance fiction. At Avon's initial stages, it was an American paperback book and comic book publisher. The shift in content occurred in the early 1970s with multiple Avon romance titles rea ...

, 1982) * ''The Office'' ( Ballantine Books, 1987) * ''The Villagers'' (Painted Leaf Press, 2000)

Non-fiction

* ''The Man Who Would Marry Susan Sontag, and Other Intimate Literary Portraits of the Bohemian Era'' (

University of Wisconsin Press The University of Wisconsin Press (sometimes abbreviated as UW Press) is a non-profit university press publishing peer-reviewed books and journals. It publishes work by scholars from the global academic community; works of fiction, memoir and p ...

, 2006, paperback edition, 2007) * ''Kabuli Days: Travels in Old Afghanistan'' (World Parade Books, 2008) * ''Voyage to Destruction: The Moroccan Letters of Alfred Chester'' (Spuyten Duyvil, 2022)

Anthologies and editorial

* ''A Geography of Poets'' (Bantam Books, 1979) * (with C. Stetler/G. Locklin) ''A New Geography of Poets'' (

University of Arkansas Press The University of Arkansas Press is a university press that is part of the University of Arkansas and has been a member of the Association of University Presses since 1984. Its mission is to publish peer-reviewed books and academic journals. It ...

, 1992) * Editor, ''Head of a Sad Angel, Stories by Alfred Chester'' (Black Sparrow, 1990). Introduction by

Gore Vidal Eugene Luther Gore Vidal (; born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual known for his epigrammatic wit, erudition, and patrician manner. Vidal was bisexual, and in his novels and e ...

. * Editor, ''Looking For Genet, Essays by Alfred Chester'' (Black Sparrow Press, 1992) * Editor, ''Dancing with a Tiger, Selected Poems by Robert Friend'' (Spuyten Duyvil, 2003)

Periodicals

Poetry and essays in ''

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 ...

'', ''

New York Review of Books New is an adjective referring to something recently made, discovered, or created. New or NEW may refer to: Music * New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz Albums and EPs * ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013 * ''New'' (EP), by Regurgitator ...

'', '' Gay & Lesbian Review'', ''

Partisan Review ''Partisan Review'' (''PR'') was a small-circulation quarterly "little magazine" dealing with literature, politics, and cultural commentary published in New York City. The magazine was launched in 1934 by the Communist Party USA–affiliated Joh ...

'', ''

The Nation ''The Nation'' is an American liberal biweekly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's '' The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper t ...

'', '' Evergreen Review'', '' New York Times Book Review'', '' Michigan Quarterly'', '' Raritan Quarterly Review'', ''

Parnassus Mount Parnassus (; el, Παρνασσός, ''Parnassós'') is a mountain range of central Greece that is and historically has been especially valuable to the Greek nation and the earlier Greek city-states for many reasons. In peace, it offers ...

'', and ''

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. ' ...

''.

Miscellaneous

* Wrote narration for documentary film ''To Be Alive'', which won Academy Award, 1965 * Readings at the Library of Congress, Poetry Center, YMHA, and hundreds of colleges and universities * Taught poetry workshops at the Poetry Center, YMHA, Sarah Lawrence, Hofstra U. * Editor of The Alfred Chester Society Newsletter

Awards and honors

(Academy of American Poets), 1962 * Guggenheim Fellowship, 1963 *

(Poetry Society of America), 1974 * Prix de Rome (American Academy of Arts & Letters), 1981 * Lambda Literary Award, 1993 * Bill Whitehead Lifetime Achievement Award (Publishing Triangle), 2005 * W. H. Auden Award (Sheep Meadow Foundation), 2005

References

External links

Field's website

Benjamin Ivry, "British Literary Doyenne's Letters to Gay Poet"
, ''The Forward'' , March 9, 2012
Interview with Edward Field, September 2016Edward Field papers
held b
Special Collections, University of Delaware LibraryEdward Field Alfred Chester archives
a
Special Collections, University of Delaware Library
{{DEFAULTSORT:Field, Edward 1924 births American male poets Living people American gay writers Lambda Literary Award for Gay Poetry winners American LGBT poets Writers from Brooklyn People from Lynbrook, New York LGBT Jews Jewish American poets 20th-century American poets 21st-century American poets American LGBT military personnel Gay military personnel United States Army Air Forces personnel of World War II United States Army Air Forces officers Shot-down aviators 20th-century American male writers 21st-century American male writers Gay poets