Background
Shapiro, Harvey was born on January 27, 1924 in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Son of Jacob J. and Dorothy (Cohen) Shapiro.
(First edition. Poets in Swallow paperbacks. Lightly rubbe...)
First edition. Poets in Swallow paperbacks. Lightly rubbed printed wrappers lightly darkened at the edges. 29, 3 pages. stiff paper wrappers.. 12mo..
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0007EDODE/?tag=2022091-20
(With enormous wit and vitality, Harvey Shapiro's new coll...)
With enormous wit and vitality, Harvey Shapiro's new collection of poems focuses on the approach of death, mingling canny observations of the city that never sleeps with homages to Hart Crane, George Oppen, the poet Rachel, and David Ignatow. Characterized by its focus on the urban world of New York, the Jewish tradition, and domesticity, Shapiro's poetry achieves a distinctive brilliance and true wisdom. These poems view life from the vantage of seventy-six years, deeply informed by the serious study of literature and language and always attuned to the present, as well as to the body, weather, and sex. With its passion, humor, and rich detail, this exquisite volume marks Harvey Shapiro's finest work to date.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0819564613/?tag=2022091-20
(This is the book of an urban mystic, someone who believes...)
This is the book of an urban mystic, someone who believes that the streets he walks, the incidents he sees and in which he sometimes plays a part have significance; he understands that the hidden beauty and music of New York City. Madison Avenue, the Brooklyn Bridge, Central Park appear and reappear as though they, the poet, and the work were inseparable. The people he recalls – a bag lady, E.E. Cummings – are as familiar to us as the city itself, but here they are lyrical and light, these poems also hold love, loss, melancholy, and tenderness –they reflect the incessant rhythms between a man and his surroundings.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0819560960/?tag=2022091-20
(Direct, informal, and richly evocative of his Jewish heri...)
Direct, informal, and richly evocative of his Jewish heritage and New York City home, Harvey Shapiro’s poetry has occupied a unique place in American letters for over 50 years. This new collection brings together his latest work and much of his 11 previous collections, revealing the full arc of his carefully calibrated poetics. Shapiro engages themes including the immigrant experience, urban landmarks and lifestyles, family life, and war. The reader will see the more formal British-tinged cadences of his earlier work give way to the colloquial, personal nature of his later poems, and how Shapiro’s candor and simplicity mark his work throughout the last five decades. Bringing the city and its balance of despair and exuberance into stark relief, this poetry is intimately attuned both to life’s quiet disappointments and to its unanticipated miracles.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0819567957/?tag=2022091-20
Shapiro, Harvey was born on January 27, 1924 in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Son of Jacob J. and Dorothy (Cohen) Shapiro.
He studied at Yale University but joined the Army Air Forces when World World War II broke out.
He wrote a dozen books of poetry from 1953 to 2006, writing in epigrammatic style about things in his everyday life. As an editor, he was always affiliated with The New York Times in some capacity, mainly in the magazine and book reviews, from 1957 to 2005. He spoke Yiddish. When he was a boy, his family moved to Manhattan and later to Long Island.
He flew 35 combat missions over Europe as a B-17 tail gunner and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.
He returned to Yale to earn a bachelor"s degree in English in 1947 and a master"s degree in American literature from Columbia University in 1948. Shapiro spent the first half of the 1950s teaching English at Cornell University and Bard College.
He then became an assistant editor at Commentary magazine and was the poetry editor at The Village Voice and a fiction editor at The New Yorker before joining The New York Times in 1957. He worked in various editorial positions there—The New York Times Magazine, The New York Times Book Review from 1975 to 1983 and deputy editor of the magazine.
Perhaps the most notable non-achievement at The New York Times was in 1962 when he had read that civil rights leader Doctor Martin Luther King, Junior. had been put in jail.
He phoned Doctor King"s foundation, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and suggested that, the next time King was put in jail, he should compose a letter to publish. This letter became the Letter from Birmingham Jail, after Doctor King was arrested for the Birmingham campaign in April 1963. Shapiro"s superiors would not allow him to print Doctor King"s letter in The New York Times, but the letter was printed elsewhere 50 times in 325 editions, including Doctor King"s own book Why We Can"t Wait.
He also edited an anthology entitled s of World World War World War II
(With enormous wit and vitality, Harvey Shapiro's new coll...)
(This is the book of an urban mystic, someone who believes...)
(Direct, informal, and richly evocative of his Jewish heri...)
(Book by Shapiro, Harvey)
(Shapiro, Harvey. Battle Report. Selected Poems. First Edi...)
(First edition. Poets in Swallow paperbacks. Lightly rubbe...)
Served with United States Army Air Force, World World War World War II. Club: Elizabethan (New Haven), Century (New York.
Married Edna Lewis Kaufman, July 23, 1953 (divorced). Children: Saul, Dan.