A Poet Never to be Forgotten: Galway Kinnell’s Story

By: Sona Shah

In the eyes of Galway Kinnell, “poetry is the attempt to find a language that can speak the unspeakable” (World Poets, pg 49).  His poetry expands more on his theory, creating countless vivid pictures in your mind that “speak the unspeakable.”  Influenced by many poets such as John Keats, Walt Whitman, Yeats, Rilke, Emily Dickinson, and William Carlos William, Kinnell has many published works that range from simple poems to extensive books. Although Kinnell tends to write about death, selfhood, and the wild, he also composes poems about everyday occurrences.  For example, in one of his famous poems, he writes about blackberries, the title being Blackberry Eating.  Kinnell has many pieces of work that are both inspired by others, and that come from his own experiences.

           Born to an Irish mother and a Scottish father, Kinnell was born in Providence, Rhode Island on February 1, 1927.  His mother, Elizabeth, and his father, James, had four children, Galway being the youngest.  He grew up in Pawtucket, Rhode Island.  While in his high-school years, he decided he would like to go to college.  He was accepted in Princeton University in 1944, and then graduated in 1948 with highest honors.  Kinnell went to the University of Rochester, where he received his master’s degree in English in 1949.  After serving in the navy after receiving his degree, he taught at many places, and even went to Iran to teach.  Having translated many works, he was the prize-winning translator of François Villon, Yves Bonnefoy, and Rainer Maria Rilke.  Married to Inés Delgado de Torres in 1965, they have two children, Maud (1966), and Finn Fergus (1968).  Kinnell wrote one of his most famous poems about Fergus, called “Fergus Falling.”  Twenty years later, Inés and Galway got divorced. 

While Kinnell was in college, he started writing.  In 1960, he published his first book and first showed it to his mentor, Charles Bell.  For many of his published works, he received awards from the 1970’s to 2000.  Some of his main awards are the Shelley prize of the Poetry Society of America (1974), the Medal of Merit of National Institute of Arts and Letters (1975), the Rochefeller Grant, being recognized as the state poet of Vermont, and the Pultizer prize for his book Selected Poems.  Galway Kinnell is one of the best known poets.

Published Works

Poetry

What a Kingdom It Was. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1960.

Flower Herding on Mount Monadnock. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1964.

Body Rags. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1968.

First Poems 1946-1954. Mt. Horeb, Wis.: Perishable Press, 1970.

The Book of Nightmares. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. 1971.

The Shoes of Wandering. Mt. Horeb, Wis.: Perishable Press, 1970.

The Avenue Bearing the Initial of Christ into the New World: Poems 1946-1964. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1974.

Three Poems. New York: Phoenix Book Shop, 1976.

Mortal Acts, Mortal Words. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1980.

Selected Poems. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1982.

The Past. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1985.

When One Has Lived a Long Time Alone. New York: Knopf, 1990

Prose

Black Light. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1966. Rev. ed. San Francisco: North Point Press, 1981. Novel.

Walking Down the Stairs: Selections from Interviews. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1978.

How the Alligator Missed Breakfast. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1982. Children's book.

Translations

Bitter Victory, by Rene Hardy. New York: Doubleday, 1956. Novel.

The Poems of François Villon. New York: New American Library, 1965. Rev. ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1977.

On the Motion and Immobility Of Douve, by Yves Bonnefoy. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1968. Poems.

Lackawanna Elegy, by Yvan Goll. Fremont, Mich.: Sumac, 1970. Poems.