Born in Ames, Iowa, in 1939, the former U.S. poet laureate completed a bachelor of science degree from Iowa State University in 1962. In 1968, he earned a master of arts degree from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
He currently serves as visiting professor in creative writing at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Until his retirement, he worked as a vice-president at Lincoln Benefit Life, an insurance company. He and his wife, Kathleen Rutledge, live on a farm in Nebraska; they have a son and a granddaughter.
Poet Laureate
In 2004, Ted Kooser was appointed U.S. poet laureate, and in April 2005 James H. Billington, Librarian of Congress, reappointed him. During that same week in April that Kooser received the reappointment as poet laureate, he won the Pulitzer Prize for his book of poems, Delights & Shadows.
Kooser has published extensively in such influential journals as The Atlantic Monthly, The New Yorker, Poetry, and The Hudson Review. His work appears in textbooks used at the high school and college level, and he has benefitted from two National Endowments of the Arts fellowships in poetry, the Stanley Kunitz Prize, the Pushcart Prize, the James Boatwright Prize, and a Merit Award from the Nebraska Arts Council.
Popular Poet and Essayist
The poet laureate has read his poetry across the country for the Academy of American Poetry. He has also read at many universities, including the University of California at Berkeley, Cornell, Case Western Reserve, The School of the Art Institute in Chicago, and Wesleyan University. He has taught workshops at many of these universities.
Not only does he write poetry, but also composes essays, plays, fiction, and literary criticism. His nonfiction book Local Wonders: Seasons in the Bohemian Alps has won numerous awards. The University of Nebraska Press published his latest book of prose The Poetry Home Repair Manual in January 2005, a book offering guidance to beginning poets.
As both editor and publisher at Windflower Press, Kooser published contemporary poetry, including two literary magazines, The Salt Creek Reader (1967-1975) and The Blue Hotel (1980-1981). The former won several grants from the National Endowment of the Arts. The Windflower publication, The Windflower Home Almanac of Poetry, was honored as the best book from a small press in 1980.
American Life in Poetry
Each poet laureate establishes his/her own schema while serving as poet laureate, and Ted Kooser has initiated a unique venue for achieving the goal of increasing readership for poetry: his American Life in Poetry offers a column free to newspapers each week. The project will celebrate its 170th column this week.
Kooser has published ten collections of poetry. Critics have characterized his style as "haiku-like imagist." His work is often compared to Kentuckian Wendell Berry, but Kooser’s work is seen as less intense than Berry, less religious, and probably less universal.
Kooser’s poetry is called “accessible” which means it is easy to understand. To many modern, or post-modern, American minds, such a distinction is the kiss of death. The lovers of obscure verse will find plenty in Kooser to deride, but the rationale for maintaining the position of poet laureate is to help make poetry more accessible in order to attract a wider audience for the art.
Kooser's work is pleasurable, as poetry should always be, with just enough wit to bring a smile and just enough nature description to bring back remembered experience.
