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Ted Kooser

Ted Koos­er is known for his poet­ry and essays that cel­e­brate the quo­tid­i­an and cap­ture a van­ish­ing way of life. Poet and crit­ic Brad Lei­thauser wrote in the New York Times Book Review that, Whether or not he orig­i­nal­ly set out to…[Kooser’s] become, per­force, an elegist.” Pop­u­lat­ed by farm­ers, fam­i­ly ances­tors, and heir­looms, Kooser’s poems reflect his abid­ing inter­est in the past while offer­ing clear-eyed appraisal of its hard­ships. While Kooser’s work often treats themes like love, fam­i­ly and the pas­sage of time, Lei­thauser not­ed that Kooser’s poet­ry is rare for its sense of being so firm­ly and endur­ing­ly root­ed in one locale.” His col­lec­tions of poet­ry include Delights and Shad­ows (2004), Fly­ing at Night: Poems 1965 – 1985 (2005), Split­ting an Order (2016), and Kind­est Regards: New and Select­ed Poems (2018). In part­ner­ship with the Poet­ry Foun­da­tion, Koos­er found­ed Amer­i­can Life in Poet­ry,” which offers a free week­ly poem to news­pa­pers across the Unit­ed States. The aim of the pro­gram is to raise the vis­i­bil­i­ty of poet­ry. Kooser’s oth­er pub­li­ca­tions, includ­ing The Poet­ry Home Repair Man­u­al: Prac­ti­cal Advice for Begin­ning Poets (2005) and Writ­ing Brave and Free (2006), offer help to aspir­ing poets and writ­ers, both in the guise of prac­ti­cal writ­ing tips and essays on poet­ry, poets, and craft. Com­ment­ing on his writ­ing, Koos­er has said, I write for oth­er peo­ple with the hope that I can help them to see the won­der­ful things with­in their every­day expe­ri­ences. In short, I want to show peo­ple how inter­est­ing the ordi­nary world can be if you pay atten­tion.”

Though Koos­er does not con­sid­er him­self a region­al poet, his work often takes place in a rec­og­niz­ably Mid­west­ern set­ting; when Koos­er was named US poet lau­re­ate in 2004, he was described by the librar­i­an of Con­gress as “‘the first poet lau­re­ate cho­sen from the Great Plains.” How­ev­er, David Mason in the Prairie Schooner saw Kooser’s work as more than mere­ly region­al. Koos­er, Mason wrote, has most­ly made short poems about per­cep­tion itself, the signs of human habi­ta­tion, the uncer­tain­ty of human knowl­edge and accom­plish­ment.” In his book Can Poet­ry Mat­ter, the crit­ic Dana Gioia described Koos­er as a pop­u­lar poet” — not one who sells mil­lions of books, but pop­u­lar in that unlike most of his peers he writes nat­u­ral­ly for a non­lit­er­ary pub­lic. His style is accom­plished but extreme­ly sim­ple — his dic­tion drawn from com­mon speech, his syn­tax con­ver­sa­tion­al. His sub­jects are cho­sen from the every­day world of the Great Plains, and his sen­si­bil­i­ty, though more sub­tle and artic­u­late, is that of the aver­age Mid­west­ern­er. Koos­er nev­er makes an allu­sion that an intel­li­gent but unbook­ish read­er will not imme­di­ate­ly grasp. There is to my knowl­edge no poet of equal stature who writes so con­vinc­ing­ly in a man­ner the aver­age Amer­i­can can under­stand and appre­ci­ate.” Gioia argued that it is Kooser’s inter­est in pro­vid­ing small but gen­uine insights into the world of every­day expe­ri­ence” that cut him off from the spe­cial­ized minor­i­ty read­er­ship that now sus­tains poetry.”

Though Gioia not­ed that Koos­er has not received sus­tained atten­tion from aca­d­e­m­ic crit­ics,” he is con­sid­ered by some to be among the best poets of his gen­er­a­tion. How­ev­er, Kooser’s fame — includ­ing a Pulitzer Prize for Poet­ry — came late in his career. Koos­er began writ­ing in his late teens and took a posi­tion teach­ing high school after grad­u­at­ing from Iowa State Uni­ver­si­ty in 1962. He enrolled in the grad­u­ate writ­ing pro­gram at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Nebras­ka but essen­tial­ly flunked out a year lat­er. Real­iz­ing that he had to make a liv­ing, Koos­er took an entry-lev­el job with an insur­ance com­pa­ny in Nebras­ka. He would remain in the indus­try until 1999, even­tu­al­ly becom­ing a vice-pres­i­dent of Lin­coln Ben­e­fit Life Com­pa­ny. Through­out his insur­ance career, Koos­er wrote poems, usu­al­ly from about five-thir­ty to sev­en o’clock each morn­ing before he went to the office. Koos­er has wry­ly not­ed that, though both he and Wal­lace Stevens spent their work­ing lives as insur­ance exec­u­tives, Stevens had far more time to write on the job.

Kooser’s ear­ly work attends to the sub­jects that con­tin­ue to shape his career: the tri­als and trou­bles of inhab­i­tants of the Mid­west, heir­looms and objects of the past, and obser­va­tion of every­day life. Kooser’s first new and select­ed, Sure Signs (1980) was crit­i­cal­ly praised. The Black War­rior Book Review main­tained it could well become a clas­sic pre­cise­ly because so many of the poems are not only excel­lent but are read­i­ly pos­sessible.” In Bliz­zard Voic­es (1986), Koos­er records the dev­as­ta­tion of the Children’s Bliz­zard” of 1888, using doc­u­ments writ­ten at the time as well as rem­i­nisces record­ed lat­er. The Oma­ha World-Her­ald called it a reader’s the­ater … short but pow­er­ful.” The well-observed truths of Kooser’s next book, Weath­er Cen­tral (1994), led Book­list crit­ic Ray Olson to note that the scenes and actions in [Kooser’s] poet­ry (espe­cial­ly the way that, in sev­er­al poems, light — the quin­tes­sen­tial phys­i­cal real­i­ty on the plains — is a vir­tu­al­ly cor­po­re­al actor) will seem, to para­phrase Pope, things often seen but né’er so well observed.” In the late 1990s, Koos­er devel­oped can­cer and gave up both his insur­ance job and writ­ing. When he began to write again, it was to paste dai­ly poems on post­cards he sent in cor­re­spon­dence with his friend and fel­low writer Jim Har­ri­son. The result was the col­lec­tion of poems called Win­ter Morn­ing Walks: 100 Post­cards to Jim Har­ri­son (2001). In poems both both play­ful and seri­ous, Koos­er avoids talk­ing direct­ly about his ill­ness. Rather, he refers to dis­ease and the pos­si­bil­i­ty of dying in metaphors focus­ing on the coun­try­side around his Nebras­ka home, where he took long walks for inspi­ra­tion. Kooser’s gift for sim­i­le and metaphor is notable: Koos­er is one of the best mak­ers of metaphor alive in the coun­try, and for this alone he deserves hon­or,” wrote Mason in a review of Win­ter Morn­ing Walks for Prairie Schooner.

Kooser’s essay col­lec­tions include Local Won­ders: Sea­sons in the Bohemi­an Alps (2002) and Lights on a Ground of Dark­ness (2009). Both vol­umes med­i­tate on place and fam­i­ly. The essays in Local Won­ders cov­er one year, or four sea­sons, in the author’s life. Although Koos­er reflects on his younger days, the essays focus large­ly on the details of his cur­rent life and sur­round­ings. In a con­tri­bu­tion to Writer, Kate Fla­her­ty said, Kooser’s med­i­ta­tions on life in south­east­ern Nebras­ka are as metic­u­lous and exquis­ite as his many col­lec­tions of poet­ry, and his qui­et ret­i­cence and dry humor are refresh­ing in this age of spill-it-all mem­oirs.” Lights on a Ground of Dark­ness focus­es on Kooser’s fam­i­ly, espe­cial­ly his Uncle Elvy. David Ulin of the Los Ange­les Times described the book as writ­ten in a prose as spare as a win­ter sun­set,” adding that it is an ele­gy, not just for Kooser’s fore­bears but for all of us.”

For Braid­ed Creek: A Con­ver­sa­tion in Poet­ry (2003) Koos­er again teamed up with Har­ri­son to pub­lish their cor­re­spon­dence con­sist­ing of entire­ly short poems writ­ten to each oth­er while Koos­er was recov­er­ing from can­cer. Writ­ing in Poet­ry, con­trib­u­tor Ray Olson not­ed that wit and wis­dom” are the main­stay of these cor­re­spon­dences. Olson added, Their con­ver­sa­tion always repays eaves­drop­ping.” Kooser’s next book, Delights and Shad­ows (2004) went on to win the Pulitzer Prize for Poet­ry. In the Wash­ing­ton Post poet and crit­ic Ed Hirsch not­ed that there is a sense of qui­et amaze­ment at the core of all Kooser’s work, but it espe­cial­ly seems to ani­mate his new col­lec­tion of poems.” Describ­ing the work as a book of por­traits and land­scapes … small won­ders and hard dualisms,” Hirsch com­pared Kooser’s art to oth­er Great Plains’ poets who write an unadorned, prag­mat­ic, quin­tes­sen­tial­ly Amer­i­can poet­ry of emp­ty places, of farm­land and low-slung cities,” craft­ing poems of stur­dy forth­right­ness with hid­den depths.”

When Koos­er was named America’s nation­al poet lau­re­ate in 2004, the hon­or coin­cid­ed with the pub­li­ca­tion of Fly­ing at Night: Poems 1965 – 1985 (2005), a col­lec­tion of his pre­vi­ous­ly pub­lished poet­ry. At the time, the self-effac­ing poet was by no means a house­hold name. How­ev­er, Koos­er used his post as lau­re­ate to fur­ther the cause of poet­ry with a gen­er­al read­ing audi­ence, found­ing Amer­i­can Life in Poet­ry,” and writ­ing the crit­i­cal­ly acclaimed Poet­ry Home Repair Man­u­al. Kooser’s most recent col­lec­tions include Split­ting and Order and Kind­est Regards: New and Select­ed Poems, which James Crew reviewed in the North Amer­i­can Review. Crews not­ed that these poems train us to pay atten­tion to what we might be tempt­ed to ignore in pur­suit of the loud­er and more col­or­ful enter­tain­ments now avail­able to us at the touch of a screen. Yet even the briefest moments that Koos­er pre­serves can lead us more deeply into our own lives.”

Koos­er teach­es poet­ry and non­fic­tion at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Nebras­ka, and con­tin­ues to write. I waste very lit­tle time any­more,” he said an inter­view for the Uni­ver­si­ty of Nebras­ka Eng­lish Depart­ment newslet­ter. In addi­tion to the Pulitzer Prize, his many hon­ors and awards include the Nebras­ka Book Award, a Push­cart Prize, the Stan­ley Kunitz Prize, a Mer­it Award from the Nebras­ka Arts Coun­cil and two fel­low­ships from the Nation­al Endow­ment for the Arts.