20th century American poet
William Bronk (1918-1999) was born in Hudson Falls, New York. He was educated at Dartmouth College where he was a student of Sidney Cox. After some graduate work at Harvard University, he served in the Army during World War II, and taught briefly at Union College, Schenectady. His first book of poems, Light and Dark, was published by Origin Press in 1956. Bronk received the National Book Award in 1982. He passed away in 1999.
In 1982 William Bronk won the American Book Award for his book Life Supports: New & Collected Poems. Since then, he has written seven additional books, and Sagetrieb has devoted an entire issue to his work. Bronk is unquestionably a major poet––utterly original, uncompromisingly abstract in content, and deeply sensuous in form. Michael Heller, in The New York Times Book Review, said Bronk’s poetry is “singularly persistent in its own investigation of how our deepest truths are those which are most unsayable.” This volume spans Bronk’s entire career, from his first book Light and Dark, to his most recent Some Words and The Mild Day (Talisman), which the Village Voice praised as “offering epigrammatic style, philosophical reverie, and haiku-like concision.” Selected Poems is an indispensible collection, containing the most compelling and the most popular of Bronk’s eloquent poems.
