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Home » Mona Van Duyn

Mona Van Duyn

Biography Mona Van Duyn

Mona Van Duyn (1921-2004) was an award-winning poet, a highly respected editor, and an experienced teacher of younger writers. She was born in Waterloo, Iowa and studied at the University of Northern Iowa where she earned a B.A. and at the University of Iowa where she received an M.A. in 1943. In that same year, Van Duyn married Jarvis Thurston with whom she founded Perspective magazine in 1947. She edited the quarterly with Thurston until 1975.

Van Duyn taught writing at a number of schools, including the University of Iowa, the University of Louisville, and at numerous writing workshops and conferences around the country. At Washington University, she taught in University College, the English Department, and in the Writing Program as a visiting Hurst professor in 1987. Van Duyn also served as poetry consultant for Washington University Libraries’ Modern Literature Collection in the mid-1960s and was instrumental in the acquisition of a number of the literary manuscript collections owned by Washington University Libraries.

She published ten volumes of poetry: Valentines to the Wide World, 1959; A Time of Bees, 1964; To See, To Take, 1970; Bedtime Stories, 1972; Merciful Disguises, 1973; Letters From a Father and Other Poems, 1982; Near Changes, 1990; Firefall, 1993; If It Be Not I, 1993; and Selected Poems, 2002. She received many awards for her poetry, including the prestigious Bollingen Award in 1970, the National Book Award for Poetry in 1971 for To See, To Take, and the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry in 1991 for Near Changes.

From 1992-1993, she served as the first woman Poet Laureate of the United States. Van Duyn was also named a Fellow of the Academy of American Poets in 1980 and in 1985 served as one of its chancellors. She received fellowships from The Academy of American Poets, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Washington University, Cornell College, the University of Northern Iowa, George Washington University, and the University of the South all awarded her the degree of Honorary Doctor of Letters. Mona Van Duyn died of bone cancer on December 2, 2004.

Collection Description

The Mona Van Duyn Papers contain manuscripts and editorial matter toward her books, including the award-winning To See, To Take and Near Changes. In addition, there are numerous drafts of individual poems and correspondence from and manuscripts by numerous literary figures.

Endings

Mona Van Duyn

Letters from a Father

Mona Van Duyn

A Relative and an Absolute

Mona Van Duyn

Three Valentines to the Wide World

Mona Van Duyn

Death by Aesthetics

Mona Van Duyn

Woman Waiting

Mona Van Duyn

Earth Tremors Felt in Missouri

Mona Van Duyn

Letter From a Father

Mona Van Duyn

What The Motorcycle Said

Mona Van Duyn

The Wish to Be Believed

Mona Van Duyn

What I Want to Say

Mona Van Duyn

Views

Mona Van Duyn

To a Friend Who Threw Away Hair Dyes

Mona Van Duyn

A Time of Bees

Mona Van Duyn

Three Valentines to the Wide World

Mona Van Duyn

Sonnet for Minimalists

Mona Van Duyn

A Small Excursion

Mona Van Duyn

Since You Asked Me….

Mona Van Duyn

A Serious Case

Mona Van Duyn

Photographs

Mona Van Duyn

Passing Thought

Mona Van Duyn

Open Letter, Personal

Mona Van Duyn

Open Letter from a Constant Reader

Mona Van Duyn

Near Changes

Mona Van Duyn

Mr. and Mrs. Jack Sprat in the Kitchen

Mona Van Duyn

The Miser

Mona Van Duyn

Minimalist Sonnets

Mona Van Duyn

Long Stretch Minimalist Sonnet

Mona Van Duyn

A Kind of Music

Mona Van Duyn

Insiders

Mona Van Duyn

In the Cold Kingdom

Mona Van Duyn

In Bed with a Book

Mona Van Duyn

The Good Man

Mona Van Duyn

Glad Heart at the Supermarket

Mona Van Duyn

The Gentle Snorer

Mona Van Duyn

A Garland for Christopher Smart

Mona Van Duyn

The Gardener to His God

Mona Van Duyn

For May Swenson

Mona Van Duyn

Falling in Love at Sixty-Five

Mona Van Duyn

Extra Time

Mona Van Duyn

Eros to Howard Nemerov

Mona Van Duyn

Earth

Mona Van Duyn

The Dormitory

Mona Van Duyn

Death by Aesthetics

Mona Van Duyn

The Creation

Mona Van Duyn

Closures

Mona Van Duyn

The Challenger

Mona Van Duyn

The Case of The

Mona Van Duyn

The Burning of Yellowstone

Mona Van Duyn

A Bouquet of Zinnias

Mona Van Duyn

Birthday Card for a Psychiatrist

Mona Van Duyn

The Beginning

Mona Van Duyn

The Ballad of Blossom

Mona Van Duyn

Advice to a God

Mona Van Duyn

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