Gail Mazur (b. 1937) is an American poet born and raised in Massachusetts.[1] She has published seven books of poetry, and They Can't Take That Away From Me (2001) was a finalist for the National Book Award for Poetry.
Gail Mazur | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Mazur in the 1960s | |
| Born | 1937 |
| Education | Smith College (1959) |
| Occupation | Poet |
| Spouse | Michael Mazur |
Career
editMazur graduated from Smith College in Massachusetts in 1959. As of 2021, she taught creative writing in Boston University's MFA program.[2] From 1995 to 2016, she was the senior distinguished writer-in-residence at Emerson College.[3]
In 1968, Mazur and her husband, Michael Mazur, co-founded Artists Against Racism and the War. Mazur founded the Blacksmith House Poetry series in 1973 and directed it for 29 years. She founded the series in part to help writers feel less isolated and encourage a fellowship of poets.[4][5][3][1]
Awards and honors
editMazur was awarded a literature fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1977.[6] They Can't Take That Away From Me (2001) was a finalist for the National Book Award for Poetry; the citation said the book was "mordant and passionate, narrative and meditative".[7][8] In 2005, she received the St. Botolph Club Foundation's Distinguished Artist Award.[9] Her collection Zeppo's First Wife: New and Selected Poems won the Massachusetts Book award and was a finalist for the 2005 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Poetry.[10][11]
Mazur was The Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation Fellow 2008-2009 at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute.[9]
Reception
editIn a review of The Common (1995), Jennifer Clarvoe wrote that the poems in the fourth section "confront and do not soften the impact of genuine hurt and death and loss".[12] At Harvard Review, Tina Barr wrote that in Zeppo's First Wife (2005), Mazur's poems let readers encounter "the recognition of the importance of a civil conscience all but lost from the larger culture".[13] In Land's End (2020), several poems are set in Provincetown, Massachusetts. Writing at The Provincetown Independent, Susan Brown writes that the collection builds "a palette of primal elements ... to express the yearnings of mortality."[14] Mazur wrote Forbidden City after the death of her of her husband. Joyce Peseroff, writing at On the Seawall, wrote that Mazur's poems in this collection reflect how art and imagination can give relief from sorrow.[15] At Hyperallergic, John Yau noticed that Mazur never analyzes her feelings in Forbidden City (2016), which makes the poetry more powerful.[16]
Bibliography
editList taken from Mazur's profile on the Boston University website.[3]
- Nightfire David Godine Publisher, 1978
- The Pose of Happiness David Godine, Publisher, 1986
- The Common University of Chicago Press, 1995
- They Can't Take That Away from Me University of Chicago, 2001,
- Zeppo's First Wife: New and Selected Poems Univ. Chicago, 2005
- Figures in a Landscape University of Chicago Press, 2011
- Forbidden City University of Chicago Press, 2016
- Land's End: New and Selected Poems 2020[14]
References
edit- ^ a b "Gail Mazur". Poetry Foundation. 23 July 2024.
- ^ "Gail Mazur '59". www.smith.edu. Smith College. Retrieved 23 July 2024.
- ^ a b c "Gail Mazur". www.bu.edu. Boston University. Retrieved 23 July 2024.
- ^ "Gail Mazur". National Book Foundation. Retrieved 26 July 2024.
- ^ "Blacksmith House Poetry Series". ccae.org. Cambridge Center for Adult Education. Retrieved 26 July 2024.
- ^ "Literature Fellowships". www.arts.gov. National Endowment for the Arts. Retrieved 26 July 2024.
- ^ "They Can't Take That Away from Me: Finalist, National Book Awards 2001 for Poetry". National Book Foundation.
- ^ "National Book Awards 2001". National Book Foundation. Archived from the original on 2019-04-05. Retrieved 2023-04-03.
- ^ a b "Gail Mazur". Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University. Retrieved 23 July 2024.
- ^ "2005 Los Angeles Times Book Prize - Poetry Winner and Nominees". Awards Archive. 2020-03-25. Archived from the original on 2022-03-14. Retrieved 2022-03-14.
- ^ "Previous Winners". Massachusetts Center for the Book. Library of Congress Center for the Book Massachusetts Affiliate. Retrieved 26 July 2024.
- ^ Clarvoe, Jennifer (1995). "Fred Marchant's "Tipping Point". and Gail Mazur's "The Common"". Agni (42): 224. ISSN 1046-218X.
- ^ Barr, Tina (2006). "Zeppo's First Wife". Harvard Review (31).
- ^ a b Brown, Susan Rand (3 September 2020). "Gail Mazur's Ode to Provincetown". The Provincetown Independent.
- ^ Peseroff, Joyce. "Forbidden City by Gail Mazur". Ron Slate. Retrieved 26 July 2024.
- ^ Yau, John (8 May 2016). "Piercing Clarity: Gail Mazur's Poetry". Hyperallergic. Retrieved 29 July 2024.