Career
He has published poems in numerous magazines, including The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, Poetry, The American Poetry Review, and elsewhere. His 1978 collection Listeners at the Breathing Place was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. From 1970 to 1973, he was a Fulbright Lecturer at the University of Athens in Greece He has taught writing and literature at various colleges and universities, most recently as writer-in-residence at Reed College in Portland, Oregon.
Miranda"s poetry has been well received.
His first collection, Listeners at the Breathing Place, chosen for the Princeton Series of Contemporary Poets, was described as "inviting and impressive" in the Library Journal Maxine Kumin called it "a first book to be proud of," and Miranda "a versatile and sensitive poet." Writing in Poetry, Michael Heffernan called the book "breathtaking."
Miranda"s translation of Rilke"s Duino Elegies received wide praise. Robin Skelton, in The Malahat Review, said it "retains the brilliance of the original;" Robert Boyers, in Salmagundi, said, "Nowhere does it read like a translation." Rilke Scholar John Mood called it "the nearest to a definitive Elegies we"re apt ever to get in the English language." January Freeman, director of Paris Press, said, "Number other translation compares to this one." Less effusive, the review in the Virginia Quarterly Review called the translation "admirable," "clear and readable," and "faithful" to Rilke"s meaning, but found Miranda"s translation "prosaic," and prefers the translation by Harry Behn.
Miranda has not been identified strongly with a single school of poetry. Although three of his poems were included in the New Formalist collection Strong Measures, he does not limit himself to traditional forms - in fact, most of his work is free verse.
