Charles Wright

Internet Sites:

• Academy of American Poets
  Brief biography, audio files, and selected poems.
• Modern American Poets.
  Includes biography, commentary, excerpts, and bibliography.

Top of Page

Biography:

Charles Wright was born in Hardin County, Tennessee in 1935.  His family lived in various communities in eastern Tennessee and western North Carolina during his childhood.  He attended Davidson College, graduating in 1957, and then entered the Army.  During his four years of service he worked in Army Intelligence and was primarily assigned to Verona, Italy.  While in Verona he read Ezra Pound, and was inspired to start writing.

Poetry was challenging but congenial, and when his Army stint was finished in 1961 he went to the University of Iowa to participate in their prestigious Writer's Workshop.  One of his teachers there, Donald Justice, became one of Wright's most important mentors.  He graduated with an MFA in creative writing in 1963 and published his first volume of poetry, The Voyage, with a small press the same year.  Wright returned to Italy as a Fulbright Scholar at the end of 1963, remaining in Italy until 1965.  While abroad he taught at the University of Rome and began translating Italian poetry into English.  The exercise increased his poetic sensitivity, as well as exposing him to brilliant Italian poets like Eugenio Montale.

When his Fulbright award ended, Wright returned to Iowa for a year, and then found a faculty position at UC-Irvine in 1966.  He remained at the school until 1983, when he accepted a professorship at the University of Virginia.  While in California he met his wife, Holly McIntire, a photographer.  The couple were married in 1969 and have one son, Luke.

During the 1960s Wright produced several short volumes of poetry that were published by small presses.  In 1970 his first larger volume, The Grave of the Right Hand, appeared.  Published by a larger, reputable university press, the work represented a professional breakthrough for Wright, although he does not consider it as polished as his later work.  His second major work, Hard Freight, catapaulted Wright into literary fame.  The book was nominated for the National Book Award and received widespread critical praise.  His next collection, Bloodlines, a series of meditations upon his roots, was even more highly praised.   By the time Country Music (1982) won the National Book Award, Wright had established a reputation as one of America's most talented modern poets.  He has continued to produce acclaimed work, including the multiple award winner Black Zodiac (1997).

Yet Wright is not a "household name" poet, perhaps because his work is less sensational and more difficult than that of many poets.  Wright eschewes the confessional style, and although his works are suffused with autobiographical detail the meanings behind the details and images are not readily apparent.  Wright also creates long poems that are taxing to read and interpret, and difficult to excerpt effectively for soundbites or undergraduate poetry seminars.  Meaning emerges in many of his collections in the structures of the different sections; the poems and lines that make up those sections are often filled with concrete details and short on narrative or exposition.  This style, and his exploration of long, almost prose-like lines, has made him less accessible than many other modern poets.

Wright is known for his use of poetry to explore spiritual themes.  In his own unique, nondidactic fashion, Wright uses poetry as a defense against dissolution.  His poetry suggests that art is the only way to transcend inevitable mortality.  He explores the spirituality of many cultures, including his own protestant Christian upbringing, Dante's Catholicism, and Chinese mysticism, to trace the transcendent power of art.  Memory is another bulwark against the loss of meaning, and he uses layers of memory to try to construct meaning in his poetry.   For Wright, poetry is a way to connect past, present, and future together, and thus frustrate time's arrow.

References:

• McCorkle, James.  "Charles Wright." Dictionary of Literary Biography, v. 165. Detroit: Gale Research, 1996.

-- Jennifer Duke-Sylvester

Top of Page

Primary Bibliography:  

• The Voyage. Patrician Press, 1963.
  
• 6 Poems. David Freed, 1965.
  
• The Dream Animal. Toronto: Anansi, 1968.
  
• Private Madrigals. Madison, WI: Abraxas Press, 1969.
  
• The Grave of the Right Hand. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1970.
  
• The Venice Notebook. Barn Dream Press, 1971
  
• Backwater. Golem Press, 1973.
  
• Hard Freight. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1973.
  
• Bloodlines. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1975.
  
• China Trace. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1977.
  
• Colophons. Iowa City: Windhover Press, 1977.
  
• Wright: A Profile. Iowa City: Grilled Flowers Press, 1979.
  
• Dead Color. Salem, OR: Charles Seluzicki, 1980.
  
• The Southern Cross. New York: Random House, 1981.
  
• Country Music: Selected Early Poems. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1982.
  
• Four Poems of Departure. Portland, OR: Trace Editions, 1983.
  
• The Other Side of the River. New York: Random House, 1984.
  
• Five Journals. New York: Red Ozier Press, 1986.
  
• Halflife: Improvisations and Interviews 1977-87, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1988.
  
• Zone Journals. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1988.
  
• Xionia, Iowa City: Windhover Press, 1990.
  
• The World of the Ten Thousand Things: Poems 1980-1990. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1990.
  
• Chickamauga. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1995.
  
• Quarter Notes: Improvisations and Interviews. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1995.
  
• Black Zodiac. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1997.
  
• Appalachia. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1998.
  
• Negative Blue: Selected Later Poems. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2000.

Recordings:

• Poets in Person: Charles Wright with J.D. McClatchy, Modern Poetry Association, 1991

Translations:

• Campana, Dino. Orphic Songs. Oberlin, OH, Oberlin College Press, 1984.
• Montale, Eugenio. The Storm and Other Poems. Oberlin, OH, Oberlin College Press, 1978.
• ---. Motets. Iowa City: Windhover Press, 1981.

Top of Page

Secondary Bibliography:  

Bibliography:

• Wright, Stuart. "Charles Wright: A Bibliographic Chronicle, 1963-1985." Bulletin of Bibliography 43 (1986): 3-12.

Criticism:

• Andrews, Tom, ed. Point Where Things Meet: Essays on Charles Wright. Oberlin, OH: Oberlin College Press, 1995.
• Stitt, Peter. Uncertainty and Plenitude: Five Contemporary Poets. Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1997.
• Upton, Lee. The Muse of Abandonment: Origin, Identity, Mastery, in Five American Poets. Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell University Press, 1998.