Louise Glück

**Louise Elisabeth Glück** (April 22, 1943 – October 13, 2023) was an American poet. She won many awards, including the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1993 for her book _The Wild Iris_ and National Book Award of Poetry in 2014 for her book _Faithful and Virtuous Night_. She was the United States Poet Laureate in 2003. In 2020, she was honored with the Nobel Prize in Literature.

## Early life

Glück was born and raised in New York City. As a teenager, Glück had anorexia. She had psychoanalysis treatment done to help her with the illness. She studied at Sarah Lawrence College and at Columbia University.

While attending poetry workshops in college, Glück began to publish her poems. Her first publication was in _Mademoiselle_, followed soon after by poems in _Poetry_, _The New Yorker_, _The Atlantic Monthly_, _The Nation_, and other venues.

After leaving Columbia, Glück was a private secretary.

## Career

In 1968, Glück published her first collection of poems, _Firstborn_. Many critics liked it. However some said she was trying to copy Robert Lowell and Sylvia Plath". Following the publication, Glück had a long case of writer's block, which was not cured, she said, until 1971, when she began to teach poetry at Goddard College in Vermont. The poems she wrote during this time were collected in her second book, _The House on Marshland_ (1975).

In 1980, Glück's third collection, _Descending Figure_, was published. It received some criticism for its tone and subject matter, with some saying the poem was about hating children. However some critics did like it. That same year, a fire destroyed Glück's house in Vermont, resulting in the loss of most of her things.

After the fire, Glück began to write the poems that would later be in her award-winning work, _The Triumph of Achilles_ (1985). Many critics liked this work with some calling it "sharper" than her other works. One critic called her "among the important poets of our age" and made her a popular poet. From the collection, the poem "Mock Orange", has been popular with feminists.

In 1984, Glück began working with Williams College in Massachusetts. Her next collection of poems, _Ararat_ (1990), talked about loss since it was written after her father died. Glück followed this collection with one of her most popular books, _The Wild Iris_ (1992), which talked about the meaning of life. It was well liked by critics with some calling it "a milestone work". It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1993, making Glück's a popular American poet.

In 1994, she published a collection of essays called _Proofs & Theories: Essays on Poetry_. She then created _Meadowlands_ (1996), a collection of poetry about love and failing marriages. She followed it with two more collections: _Vita Nova_ (1999) and _The Seven Ages_ (2001).

In 2004, in response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Glück published a chapbook entitled _October_. It was one poem divided into six parts and was about ancient Greek myth to explore parts of trauma and suffering. That same year, she began working with Yale University.

Glück continued to publish poetry while working at Yale. She would go on to publish _Averno_ (2006), _A Village Life_ (2009), and _Faithful and Virtuous Night_ (2014). In 2012, a collection of her poems during her fifty-year career, entitled _Poems: 1962–2012_, was published. Another collection of her essays, titled _American Originality_, was released in 2017.

In October 2020, Glück was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, becoming the sixteenth female literature laureate since the prize was founded in 1901. She was the first American woman to win the Nobel Prize in literature since Toni Morrison in 1993 and the first American poet to be honored since T. S. Eliot in 1948. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, she received her prize at her home.

In 2021, Glück's collection, _Winter Recipes from the Collective_, was published. In 2022, she was promoted at Yale. In 2023, she was made a professor of English at Stanford University.

## Personal life

Glück married Charles Hertz Jr. in 1967, however the marriage ended in divorce. In 1973, Glück gave birth to a son, Noah, with her partner, Keith Monley, however their relationship ended in 1975. From 1977 until their divorce in 1996, she was married to John Dranow.

Glück's niece is the actress Abigail Savage.

Glück died from cancer at her home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on October 13, 2023, at the age of 80.

## Bibliography

- Poetry
- _Firstborn_ (1968)
- _The House on Marshland_ (1975)
- _The Garden_ (1976)
- _Descending Figure_ (1980)
- _The Triumph of Achilles_ (1985)
- _Ararat_ (1990)
- _The Wild Iris_ (1992)
- _Mock Orange_ (1993)
- _The First Four Books of Poems_ (1995)
- _Meadowlands_ (1997)
- _Vita Nova_ (1999)
- _The Seven Ages_ (2001)
- _Averno_ (2006)
- _A Village Life_ (2009) (shortlisted for the 2010 International Griffin Poetry Prize)

- Prose
- _Proofs and Theories: Essays on Poetry_ (1994)

## Related pages

- List of poets from North America
- List of poets from the United States

## Other websites

- Louise Glück at poets.org
- Louise Glück: Online Resources from the Library of Congress

## Infobox (writer)

- **name**: Louise Glück
- **image**: Louise Glück circa 1977.jpg
- **caption**: Glück
- **birth name**: Louise Elisabeth Glück
- **birth place**: New York City, New York (state), New York, United States, U.S.
- **death place**: Cambridge, Massachusetts, Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.
- **period**: 1968–2023
- **relatives**: Abigail Savage (niece)
- **partner**: Keith Monley (1973–1975)
- **children**: 1