Press Releases

MONTEREY, Calif.- W.S. Merwin, a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet will read from his collected works at Santa Catalina School in Monterey on November 12 at 8 p.m. in the Performing Arts Center, located at 1500 Mark Thomas Drive. The poetry reading is open to the public and is underwritten by the Edwin L. Wiegand Trust Dialogues in the Arts and Sciences at the Santa Catalina School as a gift to the community. Reservations are required and may be secured by calling Cynthia Bennett at 831.655.9310 or visiting www.santacatalina.org.

W.S. Merwin, a celebrated poet and environmental activist, has a career that has spanned more than 50 years, beginning with the publication of his first book, A Mask for Janus, in 1952. His book of poems entitled, The Carrier of Ladders, won the Pulitzer Prize in 1970. Mr. Merwin has also earned the Tanning Prize, the Bolligen Prize, and the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. In 1999, he was named Poetry Consultant to the Library of Congress, jointly held with fellow poets Rita Dove and Louise Glück.

Born in 1927, William was the son of a Presbyterian minister for whom he began writing hymns at the age of five. In the early years of his career, he was influenced by the works of Robert Graves who's work he translated. His style was influenced even more by people such as Robert Lowell, Sylvia Plath, Ted Hughes, Adrienne Rich and Donald Hall, all of whom he spent time with in Boston, eventually influencing his own work while breaking out of the rhetoric of the 1950s.

W.S. Merwin's recent poetry is perhaps his most personal to date, arising from his deep beliefs in anti-imperialism, pacifism and environmentalism. His poetry reflects his intimate feeling for the landscape and embraces language in a partnership that flows between the two.