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Summary Information

Repository:
Lilly Library (Indiana University, Bloomington)
Indiana University
1200 E. Seventh St.
Bloomington, IN 47405-5500
Phone: 812-855-2452
Fax: 812-855-3143
Email: liblilly@indiana.edu
http://www.indiana.edu/~liblilly

Creator
Kinnell, Galway, 1927-

Collection No.
LMC 1678

Extent
ca. 16,500 items

Language
Materials are in English

Abstract
Consists of the correspondence, writings and other papers of poet and professor Galway Kinnell, 1927- .

Access Restrictions

This collection is open for research.

Biographical Note

Galway Kinnell, born in 1927, was a poet and professor. Kinnell was born in Providence, Rhode Island, received his BA from Princeton University and his MA from the University of Rochester in New York. His teaching career began at Alfred University in New York where he taught English. Since then he has held professorships at universities literally throughout the world, from Columbia University to the University of Grenoble in France and from the University of Iran, Teheran to the University of Hawaii in Honolulu. He has been a visiting professor or poet at such distinguished universities and colleges as Sarah Lawrence, Queens College of CUNY, Brandeis University, Skidmore College and the University of California, Irvine. He was visiting writer at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia and resident writer at Deya Institute, Mallorca, Spain. In addition to his teaching duties, Kinnell has traveled extensively giving poetry readings.

Kinnell's poetry began appearing in poetry magazines and anthologies in 1953. In 1960 his first volume of poetry, What a Kingdom It Was, was published. By 1980 ten books of his poetry had been published. Although most prolific as a poet, Kinnell's other published works include: a novel, Black Light; a children's book, How the Alligator Missed Breakfast; illustrations for a book of poetry by Pati Hill; and translations of such writers as Yvan Goll, Rene Hardy, and Francois Villon.

The quality of his work over the years has brought to Kinnell many awards and prizes, such as the Ingram Merrill Foundation award, an Amy Lowell traveling fellowship, the London Translation Prize, and the Shelley Prize from the Poetry Society of America. Not least among these is the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his work Selected Poems.

Arrangement

The collection is organized into the following series: I. Correspondence; II. Illustrations by Kinnell; III. Writings by Kinnell; IV. Writings by Others; V. Memorabilia; VI. Miscellaneous. An index of titles is located at the end of the collection.

Scope and Content Note

The Kinnell mss., 1936-1980, consists of the correspondence, writings and other papers of poet and professor Galway Kinnell, 1927- . Among his papers are many drafts of the poems found in his volume Selected Poems , for which he won the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. In general, the correspondence concerns Kinnell's teaching and poetry readings. Through the exchange of writings, advice and criticism was sought among peers, and this relationship with his colleagues is also reflected in the letters.

The collection includes countless drafts and worksheets of his writings as well as page proofs, galleys, book production material and printed reviews of his published works. There is also a large section of writings by other poets and authors.

Present also are writings from Kinnell's childhood years, as well as class notes, papers, and lecture material covering his academic career.

The collection concludes with a miscellaneous section which contains, among other items, material concerning his activities with both the civil rights movement and anti-war protests of the 1960's and early 70's.

• Indexing Terms

• The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in IUCAT, the IU Libraries' online catalog. Materials about related topics, persons or places can be found by searching the catalog using these terms.

• • Names
  • Kinnell, Galway, 1927- --Correspondence.
  • Hall, Donald, 1928- --Correspondence.
  • Kinnell, Galway, 1927- --Criticism and interpretation.
  • Bell, Charles G. (Charles Greenleaf), 1916-
  • Crosby, Anne Buchanan, 1929-
  • Hall, Donald, 1928-
• • Topics
  • Authors, American --20th century --Correspondence.
  • Poetry, American --20th century.

Administrative Information