Richard Poirier

Richard Poirier (September 9, 1925 – August 15, 2009) was an American literary critic. He was known for his editorship of Raritan and Partisan Review and for co-founding the Library of America. He was a named chair professor of English Literature at Rutgers University.

Early life and education

Poirier was born on September 9, 1925[1] in Gloucester, Massachusetts.[2] After high school, he served in the US Army and served in the European theater of World War II.[2]

He graduated from Amherst College on the G.I. Bill, earned an MA from Yale University, and then a PhD from Harvard University in 1960.[2] He also studied under the literary critic F. R. Leavis at Downing College, Cambridge, on a Fulbright Scholarship during the 1950s.[2][3]

Career

He co-founded the Library of America in 1979 and served as chairman of its board.[2] He was the Marius Bewley Professor of American and English Literature at Rutgers University.[4] He was also the founder and editor of Raritan, a literary quarterly, and an editor of Partisan Review.[2] He was series editor of Prize Stories: The O. Henry Awards from 1961 to 1966.[2]

In 1968, he signed the "Writers and Editors War Tax Protest" pledge, vowing to refuse tax payments in protest against the Vietnam War.[5]

Death

Poirer died on August 15, 2009[1] in Manhattan.[2]

Works

  • Stories British and American (1953) with Jack Barry Ludwig
  • The Comic Sense of Henry James: A Study of the Early Novels (1960)
  • In Defense of Reading : A Reader's Approach to Literary Criticism (1963) editor with Reuben A. Brower
  • A World Elsewhere: The Place of Style in American Literature (1966)
  • American Literature: Volume Two (Little, Brown 1970) editor with William L. Vance
  • The Oxford Reader: Varieties of Contemporary Discourse (1971) editor with Frank Kermode
  • The Performing Self: Compositions and Decompositions in the Languages of Contemporary Life (1971)
  • Mailer (Fontana Modern Masters, 1972)
  • Robert Frost: The Work of Knowing (1977)
  • The Renewal Of Literature: Emersonian Reflections (Random House, 1987) ISBN 0-394-50140-3
  • Raritan Reading (1990) editor
  • Ralph Waldo Emerson (1990)
  • Poetry and Pragmatism (1992)
  • Collected Poems, Prose, and Plays of Robert Frost (Library of America, 1995) editor with Mark Richardson
  • Trying It Out in America: Literary and Other Performances (2003)

References

  1. 1 2 "Notice de personne: Poirier, Richard (1925-2009)". Bibliothèque Nationale de France (in French). April 7, 2022. Retrieved May 2, 2026.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Weber, Bruce (August 18, 2009). "Richard Poirier, a Scholar of Literature, Dies at 83". The New York Times. Archived from the original on September 5, 2015. Retrieved September 5, 2015.
  3. ↑ Poirier, Richard (December 12, 1963). "The Great Tradition". The New York Review of Books. Retrieved May 2, 2026.
  4. ↑ Mack, Arien, ed. (Autumn 1988). "IN TIME OF PLAGUE THE HISTORY AND SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF LETHAL EPIDEMIC DISEASE". Social Research. 55 (3). Archived from the original on 7 January 2011. Retrieved 10 March 2011.
  5. ↑ "Writers and Editors War Tax Protest" January 30, 1968 New York Post
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