Randall Jarrell
Who is Randall Jarrell
Randall Jarrell jə-REL (May 6, 1914 – October 14, 1965) was an American poet, literary critic, children's author, essayist, and novelist. He was the 11th Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress—a position that now bears the title Poet Laureate of the United States.
Among other honors, Jarrell was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship for the years 1947–48; a grant from the National Institute of Arts and Letters, in 1951; and the National Book Award for Poetry, in 1961.
Biography
Youth and education
Jarrell was a native of Nashville, Tennessee. He attended Hume-Fogg High School where he "practiced tennis, starred in some school plays, and began his career as a critic with satirical essays in a school magazine." He received his B.A....
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Randall Jarrell Poems
- Jerome
Each day brings its toad, each night its dragon.
Der heilige Hieronymus--his lion is at the zoo--
Listens, listens. All the long, soft, summer day
Dreams affright his couch, the deep boils like a pot.
...
- The Player Piano
I ate pancakes one night in a Pancake House
Run by a lady my age. She was gay.
When I told her that I came from Pasadena
She laughed and said, "I lived in Pasadena
...
- A Country Life
A bird that I don't know,
Hunched on his light-pole like a scarecrow,
Looks sideways out into the wheat
The wind waves under the waves of heat.
...
- 90 North
At home, in my flannel gown, like a bear to its floe,
I clambered to bed; up the globe's impossible sides
I sailed all night—till at last, with my black beard,
My furs and my dogs, I stood at the northern pole.
...
- Cinderella
Her imaginary playmate was a grown-up
In sea-coal satin. The flame-blue glances,
The wings gauzy as the membrane that the ashes
Draw over an old ember --as the mother
...
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Randall Jarrell Quotes
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Comments about Randall Jarrell
- Truequotation: it is the timber of poetry that wears most surely, and there is no timber that has not strong roots among the clay and worms. — randall jarrell
- Dimasnu05987022: randall jarrell
- Jamesan13514562: six miles from earth, loosed from its dream of life,
i woke to black flak and the nightmare fighters.
when i died they washed me out of the turret with a hose. randall jarrell
- Jwilliamcupp: if we judge by wealth and power, our times are the best of times; if the times have made us willing to judge by wealth and power, they are the worst of times. -randall jarrell-
- Robbyslaughter: one of the most obvious facts about grown-ups to a child is that they have forgotten what it is like to be a child. -randall jarrell
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