"Poetic Genius" Edward Hirsch Receiving Honorary Degree at Lawrence Convocation

APPLETON, WIS. -- Acclaimed poet Edward Hirsch will be awarded an honorary doctor of humane letters Tuesday, May 21 by Lawrence University at the college's annual honors convocation.

Hirsch closes out Lawrence's 2001-2002 convocation series with the address "Reading as Relationship" at 11:10 a.m. in the Lawrence Memorial Chapel. Hirsch will also conduct a question-and-answer session at 2 p.m. in Riverview Lounge of the Lawrence Memorial Union. Both events are free and open to the public.

Hailed as the leading poet of his generation, Hirsch, 52, has written five books of poems, each to critical acclaim. His most recent book, 1998's "On Love," is a collection of meditations on passion, sex and intimate friendship, in which he impersonates the point of view of numerous writers and thinkers from the past, among them Gertrude Stein, Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, Oscar Wilde and even Jimi Hendrix.

His first book, "For the Sleepwalkers" (1981), a collection of his poems, received the Lavan Younger Poets Award from the Academy of American Poets and the Delmore Schwartz Memorial Award from New York University. Five years later, his "Wild Gratitude" earned the National Book Critics Circle Award. "The Night Parade," released in 1989, and "Earthly Measures," published in 1994, were both listed among the notable books of the year by The New York Times.

In 1999, he released his handbook, "How to Read a Poem: And Fall in Love with Poetry," which became a national best seller. His most recent work, the non-fiction book, "The Demon and the Angel: Searching for the Source of Artistic Inspiration," was published earlier this year.

Among his many honors and awards are a Guggenheim Fellowship, a National Endowment for the Arts Award and an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award for Literature. In 1998, Hirsch was awarded a prestigious MacArthur Foundation "genius grant."

Hirsch's virtuosity is more a product of a personal calling than a formal study of poetry. A standout athlete in high school and college -- he earned Academic All American honors as a tight end his senior year at Grinnell College -- Hirsch credits an "excess of emotions" he didn't know how to channel for his early interest in poetry. His first poems were published in notable literary magazines while he was still an undergraduate. The books, and the awards, followed shortly.

A native of Chicago, Hirsch is the John and Rebecca Moores Scholar at the University of Houston, where has taught graduate literature courses and creative writing workshops since 1985.

In addition to his poetry, Hirsch writes regularly for The New Yorker, The New York Times Book Review and American Poetry Review and serves as a contributing editor to the Paris Review and Triquarterly.

After earning his bachelor's degree in English at Grinnell, Hirsch earned his Ph.D. in folklore at the University of Pennsylvania in 1979.

The convocation address will be Hirsch's second visit to Lawrence in the past 19 months. He was the first guest in a lecture series that debuted in October, 2000. Supported by the Mia T. Paul Poetry Fund, the series brings distinguished poets to campus for public readings and to work with students on writing poetry and verse.