Ron Padgett

Ron Padgett. Courtesy Coffee House Press.

Ron Padgett (born June 17, 1942) is an American poet, essayist , fiction writer, and translator. He was a member of the New York School.

Life

Youth and education

Padgett was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

As a 17 year-old high school student, he founded avant-garde literary magazine The White Dove Review. Collaborating with fellow Central High students Dick Gallup and Joe Brainard, along with TU student-poet Ted Berrigan, Padgett audaciously solicited work for the White Dove from Black Mountain and Beat Generation writers such as Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, LeRoi Jones, e.e. cummings, and Malcolm Cowley.

To Padgett's surprise, most of the writers submitted work to the journal. Notably, The White Dove Review printed "The Thrashing Doves" by Jack Kerouac, "My Sad Self (for Frank O'Hara)" by Allen Ginsberg, "Crap and Cauliflower" by Carl Larsen, and "Redhead" by Paul Blackburn, among many others. After 5 issues, Padgett retired the White Dove and fled Tulsa for New York City, integrating into the New York School.

Padgett received a B.A. from Columbia University in 1964 and studied creative writing at Wagner College with Kay Boyle, Howard Nemerov, and Kenneth Koch.

Career

Ron Padgett and the New York School of Poetry

Padgett was a poetry workshop instructor at the Poetry Project, (St. Mark's Church in-the-Bowery, New York), 1968-1969, and a poet in various New York City Poets in the Schools programs, 1969-1976.

He was director of publications for Teachers & Writers Collaborative from around 1982 to 1999. His works on education and writing include The Teachers & Writers Handbook of Poetic Forms (editor), The Teachers & Writers Guide to Walt Whitman (editor), Educating the Imagination (co-editor), and many others. He was also editor of Teachers & Writers Magazine from 1980 to 2000.

He was a co-founder/publisher of Full Court Press (publisher)and editor from 1973-88. He has lectured at educational institutions, including Atlantic Center for the Arts and Columbia University, He has also been the host of a radio series on poetry and the designer of computer writing games.

Recognition

He was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship and studied 20th-century French literature in Paris during 1965 and 1966.

In 1996, he was awarded a grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award.

Padgett won the Shelley Memorial Award in 2009.

Publications

Poetry

• In Advance of the Broken Arm. New York: C Press, 1964.
• Some Things (with Ted Berrigan & Joe Brainard). New York: C Press, 1964.
• Two Stories for Andy Warhol. New York: C Press, 1965.
• Sky: An 0pener. Belingham, WA: Goliards Press, 1966.
• Bean Spasms: Poems and prose (with Ted Berrigan). New York: Kulcher Press, 1967.
• Tone Arm. Once Press, 1967.
• 100,000 Fleeing Hilda (with Joe Brainard). Boke, 1967.
• Bun (with Tom Clark). New York: Angel Hair Books, 1968.
• Great Balls of Fire. New York: Holt, 1969.
• The Adventures of Mr. and Mrs. Jim and Ron (With Jim Dine). London: Cape Gouliard Press, 1970.
• Sweet Pea. Aloes, 1971.
• Poetry Collection. London: Strange Faeces Press, 1971.
• Sufferin’ Succotash (with Joe Brainard) (bound with Kiss My Ass by Michael Brownstein). Adventures in Poetry, 1971.
• Back in Boston Again (with Ted Berrigan and Tom Clark). Telegraph, 1972.
• Oo La La (with Jim Dine). New York: Petersburg Press, 1973.
• Crazy Compositions. Southampton, NY: Big Sky, 1974.
• The World of Leon (With others). Southampton, NY: Big Sky, 1974.
• Toujours l’amour. New York: Sun, 1976.
• Pullman, Arrive ((With G. Schneeman; title means “Arrive by Pullman”). Paris: Generations, 1978.
• Tulsa Kid. Calais, VT: Z Press, 1979.
• Triangles in the Afternoon. New York: Sun, 1980.
• How to Be a Woodpecker (With T. Winkfield). West Branch, IA: Toothpaste Press, 1983.
• Light as Air (With Katz). New York: Pace Editions, 1988.
• The Big Something. Great Barrington, MA: The Figures, 1990.
• New and Selected Poems. Boston: Godine, 1995.
• Poems I Guess I Wrote. New York: CUZ Editions, 2001.
• You Never Know. Minneapolis, MN: Coffee House Press, 2002.
• If I Were You: Collaborations. Toronto: Proper Tales Press, 2007.
• How to Be Perfect. Minneapolis, MN: Coffee House Press, 2008.
• How Long. Minneapolis, MN: Coffee House Press, 2011.

Plays

• Seventeen: Collected plays (with Ted Berrigan). New York: C Press, 1965.

Novel

• Antlers in the Treetops. Toronto: Coach House, 1973.

Non-fiction

• How to Be Modern Art (with Trevor Winkfiel). West Branch, IA: Coffee House Press, 1984.
• Among the Blacks (memoir; with Raymond Roussel). Bolinas, CA: Avenue B, 1988.
• Blood Work: Selected prose. Flint, MI: Bamberger Books, 1993.
• Ted: A personal memoir of Ted Berrigan. Berkeley, CA: Figures, 1993.
• Creative Reading: What it is, how to do it, and why. Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English, 1997.
• Albanian Diary. Great Barrington, MA: The Figures, 1999.
• The Straight Line: Writings on poetry and poets. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2000.
• Oklahoma Tough: My father, king of the Tulsa bootleggers. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2003.
• Joe: A memoir of Joe Brainard. Minneapolis, MN: Coffee House Press , 2004.

Translated

• Guillaume Apollinaire, The Poet Assassinated. New York: Holt, 1968.
• Pierre Cabanne, Dialogues with Marcel Duchamp. New York: Viking, 1970.
• Henry Caray, Chrononhotonothologos (adaptor, with Johnny Stanton). Boke, 1971.
• Valery Larbaud, The Poems of A.O. Barnabooth (translated with Bill Zavatsky). Tokyo: Mushinsha, 1974.
• Blaise Cendrars, Kodak. Adventures in Poetry, 1976.
• Guillaume Apollinaire, The Poet Assassinated, and other stories. Berkeley, CA: North Point Press, 1984.
• Blaise Cendrars, Complete Poems. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1992.

Edited

• Tom Veitch, Literary Days (edited with Ted Berrigan). New York: C Press, 1964.
• An Anthology of New York Poets (edited with David Shapiro). New York: Random House, 1970.
• The Whole Word Catalogue 2 (edited with Bill Zavatsky). New York: McGraw-Hill, 1976.
• The Point: Where teaching and writing intersect (edited with Nancy Larson Shapiro). New York: Teachers and Writers Collaborative, 1983.
• The Complete Poems of Edwin Denby. New York: Random House, 1986.
• The Teachers and Writers Handbook of Poetic Forms. New York: Teachers & Writers Collaborative, 1987; 2nd edition, 2000.
• Old Faithful: Eighteen writers present their favorite writing assignments (edited with Christopher Edgar). New York: Teachers & Writers Collaborative, 1995.
• World Poets (editor in chief). (3 volumes), New York: Scribner, 2000.

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy the Poetry Foundation.

Ron Padgett

Paterson Poems by Ron Padgett

Audio / video

• Ron Padgett (cassette). New York: Poetry Project at St. Mark's Church In-the-Bowery, 1975.
• Ron Padgett, August 3, 1975 (cassette). Naropa Institute, 1975.
• Ron Padgett 11.18.99 (cassette). Naropa University, 1999.

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.

See also

• New York School poets
• List of U.S. poets

External links

Poems

• "Ladies and Gentlemen in Outer Space" at Poetry 180
• Ron Padgett b. 1942 at the Poetry Foundation
• Ron Padgett at PoemHunter (8 poems)
• Ron Padgett: Nine poems at Jacket
• Ron Padgett profile & 16 poems at the Academy of American Poets

Audio / video

• Ron Padgett at PennSound
• Ron Padgett at YouTube

Books

• Ron Padgett at Amazon.com

About

• Ron Padgett Official website
• "Do It" - Review of How to be Perfect, Jacket 37 2009