1997 in poetry

Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature (for instance, Irish or France).

Events

 * January 20 &mdash; Miller Williams of Arkansas reads his poem, "Of History and Hope," at President Clinton's inauguration.
 * Regeneration (titled Behind the Lines in the United States), a film about World War I poets Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon, is released. It is based on the novel Regeneration by Pat Barker.
 * Jacket online literary magazine founded.

Works published in English
Listed by nation where the work was first published and again by the poet's native land, if different; substantially revised works listed separately:

Canada

 * Michael Barnholden, On the Ropes (Coach House Books) ISBN 978-1-55245-002-4
 * Dionne Brand, Land to Light On
 * Clint Burnham, Be Labour Reading (ECW Press) ISBN 978-1-55022-344-6
 * Kwame Dawes, editor, Wheel and Come again: An Anthology of Reggae Poetry, Fredericton, New Brunswick: Goose Lane.
 * Louis Dudek, The Caged Tiger. Montreal: Empyreal Press.
 * John Glassco, Selected Poems with Three Notes on the Poetic Process. Ottawa: Golden Dog Press)
 * Elisabeth Harvor, The Long Cold Green Evenings of Spring
 * Roy Kiyooka, Pacific Windows: The Collected Poems of Roy Kiyooka (posthumous), edited by Roy Miki
 * A.M. Klein, Selected Poems. Selected Poems Seymour Mayne, Zailig Pollock, Usher Caplan ed. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 1997. ISBN 0-8020-0734-1 ISBN 0802077536
 * Laura Lush:
 * Darkening In, Montreal: Véhicule Press
 * Fault Line, Montreal: Véhicule Press
 * Don McKay, Apparatus
 * George McWhirter, Incubus: The Dark Side of the Light
 * John Reibetanz:
 * Midland Summer
 * Near Finisterre

India, in English

 * R. Parthasarathy Rough Passage ( Poetry in English ). New Delhi: Oxford University Press, India 1977. ISBN 0-19-560690-6
 * Jeet Thayil, Apocalypso ( Poetry in English ), London: Aark Arts, 1997, ISBN 1-899179-01-1
 * Sudeep Sen, Postmarked India: New & Selected Poems ( Poetry in English ), New Delhi: HarperCollins, ISBN 81-7223-269-1
 * Eunice de Souza, editor, Nine Indian Women Poets, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-564077-2
 * Svami Bhumananda Sarasvati, editor and translator, Anthology of Vedic Hymns: Being a Collection of Hymns from the Four Vedas, Sahibabad, Ghaziabad: Kusum Lat Arya Pratishthan, India.

Ireland

 * Moya Cannon, The Parchment Boat, Oldcastle: The Gallery Press, ISBN 978-1-85235-201-1
 * Michael Coady, All Souls (poems and prose), Oldcastle: The Gallery Press, ISBN 978-1-85235-212-7
 * Aidan Murphy, Stark Naked Blues, New Island Books, ISBN 978-1-874597-67-4
 * William Wall, Mathematics And Other Poems, Collins Press, Cork ISBN 1-898256-26-8

New Zealand

 * Fleur Adcock, Looking Back, Oxford and Auckland: Oxford University Press (New Zealand poet who moved to England in 1963)
 * Jenny Bornholdt, Gregory O'Brien, and Mark Williams, editors, An Anthology of New Zealand Poetry in English, Auckland: Oxford University Press New Zealand (anthology)
 * Jenny Bornholdt, Miss New Zealand: Selected Poems
 * Diane Brown, Before The Divorce We Go To Disneyland, Tandem Press
 * Alan Brunton, Years Ago Today, documentary essay on poetry in the 1960s, Bumper Books
 * Allen Curnow, Early Days Yet: New and Collected Poems 1941-1997
 * Kendrick Smithyman, Atua Wera, Auckland: Auckland University Press, posthumous
 * Paula Green, Cookhouse, Auckland University Press

United Kingdom

 * Fleur Adcock, Looking Back, Oxford and Auckland: Oxford University Press (New Zealand poet who moved to England in 1963)
 * Simon Armitage, CloudCuckooLand (sic.)
 * Charles Causley, Collected Poems (see also Collected Poems 1975)
 * Gillian Clarke, Collected Poems, Carcanet Press, ISBN 1-85754-335-1
 * Elaine Feinstein, Daylight, Carcanet
 * Lavinia Greenlaw, A World Where News Travelled Slowly, Faber and Faber
 * Ted Hughes, Tales from Ovid; a New York Times "notable book of the year" for 1998
 * Elizabeth Jennings, In the Meantime
 * Jamie McKendrick, The Marble Fly
 * Anne MacLeod, Standing by Thistles (Scottish poet)
 * Derek Mahon, The Yellow Book. Gallery Press
 * Andrew Motion, Salt Water
 * Sean O'Brien, The Ideology (Smith/Doorstep)
 * Don Paterson, God's Gift to Women
 * Peter Reading, Work in Regress
 * Peter Redgrove:
 * Orchard End
 * What the Black Mirror Saw: New Short Fiction and Prose Poetry
 * Robin Robertson, A Painted Field
 * Labi Siffre, Monument
 * Anthony Thwaite, Selected Poems 1956–1996
 * Charles Tomlinson, Selected Poems 1955–1997

Anthologies in the United Kingdom

 * Thomas Rain Crowe with Gwendal Denez and Tom Hubbard, Writing the Wind: A Celtic resurgence: The New Celtic Poetry: Welsh, Breton, Irish Gaelic, Scottish Gaelic, Cornish, Manx, Cullowhee, NC: New Native Press
 * Michael Donaghy, Andrew Motion, Hugo Williams, poets in Penguin Modern Poets 11, Penguin
 * Iona Opie and Peter Opie, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes, Oxford: Oxford University Press

Criticism, scholarship, and biography in the United Kingdom

 * R. F. Foster, W. B. Yeats: A Life, Vol. I: The Apprentice Mage, Oxford University Press ISBN 0-19-288085-3

United States

 * Kim Addonizio, Jimmy & Rita (BOA Editions) 1997
 * Agha Shahid Ali, The Country Without a Post Office (Indian-born poet of Kashmiri heritage)
 * Dick Allen, Ode to the Cold War: Poems New and Selected (Sarabande)
 * A.R. Ammons, Glare
 * Marvin Bell, Ardor (The Book of the Dead Man, Volume 2) (Copper Canyon Press)
 * Wendell Berry, Entries (Washington, D.C.: Counterpoint)
 * Frank Bidart, Desire (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), received the Theodore Roethke Memorial Poetry Prize and the 1998 Bobbitt Prize for Poetry; nominated for the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, and the National Book Critics Circle Award
 * Allison Hedge Coke, [Dog Road Woman (Coffee House Press), "American Book Award"
 * Alfred Corn, Present (Washington: Counterpoint Press)
 * Tess Gallagher, At the Owl Woman Saloon (Scribner), a New York Times "notable book of the year"
 * Amy Clampitt, The Collected Poems of Amy Clampitt (Knopf), published posthumously, a New York Times "notable book of the year"
 * Jorie Graham, The Errancy: Poems (Ecco), a New York Times "notable book of the year"
 * Beth Gylys, Balloon Heart (Wind Publications), Winner of the Quentin R. Howard Award.
 * Robert Fagles (translator), The Odyssey by Homer (Viking), a New York Times "notable book of the year"
 * Susan Hahn, Confession (University of Chicago Press)
 * Anthony Hecht and John Hollander, Jiggery-Pokery: A Compendium of Double Dactyls
 * Paul Hoover, Viridian (University of Georgia Press)
 * Fanny Howe, One Crossed Out
 * Jane Kenyon, Otherwise: New and Selected Poems (Graywolf), a New York Times "notable book of the year"
 * Maxine Kumin, Selected Poems, 1960-1990 (Norton), a New York Times "notable book of the year"
 * Robert Hass, Sun Under Wood: New Poems (Ecco), a New York Times "notable book of the year"
 * John Hollander, The Work of Poetry (Columbia University Press)
 * Maxine Kumin, Selected Poems, 1960-1990 (W.W. Norton)
 * Philip Levine, Unselected Poems (Greenhouse Review Press)
 * Sarah Lindsay, Primate Behavior (Grove Press), National Book Award finalist
 * William Meredith, Effort at Speech: New and Selected Poems
 * W. S. Merwin, Flower and Hand: Poems, 1977-1983 (Port Townsend, Washington: Copper Canyon Press)
 * Howard Nemerov, The Collected Poems of Howard Nemerov (which wins the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, the National Book Award, and the Bollingen Prize)
 * Mary Oliver, West Wind: Poems and Prose Poems
 * Carl Rakosi, The Earth Suite 1997
 * Kenneth Rexroth, Sacramental Acts: The Love Poems
 * Rosmarie Waldrop, Another Language: Selected Poems (Talisman House)
 * C. K. Williams, The Vigil (Farrar Straus), nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award
 * David Wojahn, The Falling Hour (University of Pittsburgh Press)
 * Charles Wright, BlackZodiac (Farrar Straus)

Criticism, scholarship, and biography in the United States

 * Kim Addonizio and Dorianne Laux, The Poet's Companion: A Guide to the Pleasures of Writing Poetry
 * Joseph Blotner, Robert Penn Warren: A Biography. (Random House), one of The New York Times "notable books of the year"
 * Bonnie Costello, Celeste Goodridge and Cristanne Miller, editors, The Selected Letters of Marianne Moore (Knopf), one of The New York Times "notable books of the year"
 * Angela Davis, Blues Legacies and Black Feminism: Gertrude "Ma" Rainey, Bessie Smith, and Billie Holiday, 1997 American Book Award
 * Phyllis Grosskurth, Byron: The Flawed Angel (Peter Davison/Houghton Mifflin), one of The New York Times "notable books of the year"
 * Douglas Hofstadter, Le Ton Beau de Marot: In Praise of the Music of Language (Basic Books) "ruminations on the art of translation" with a 16th-century French poem as the prime example, one of The New York Times "notable books of the year"
 * John Hollander, The Work of Poetry (criticism)
 * Sam McCready, A William Butler Yeats Encyclopedia, Greenwood Press (scholarship)
 * Nicholas Murray, A Life of Matthew Arnold (Thomas Dunne/St. Martin's), one of The New York Times "notable books of the year"
 * Helen Vendler, The Art of Shakespeare's Sonnets (Belknap/Harvard University), one of The New York Times "notable books of the year"

Anthologies in the United States

 * Harold Bloom edits The Best of the Best American Poetry 1988-1997
 * Ross and Kathryn Petras, editors, Very Bad Poetry (Vintage)

The Best American Poetry 1997
Poems from these 75 poets are in The Best American Poetry 1997, edited by David Lehman, guest editor James Tate:


 * Ai
 * Sherman Alexie
 * Agha Shahid Ali
 * A. R. Ammons
 * Nin Andrews
 * L. S. Asekoff
 * Leevester Clay
 * John Ashbery
 * Marianne Boruch
 * Catherine Bowman
 * Joseph Brodsky
 * Stephanie Brown
 * Joshua Clover
 * Billy Collins
 * Gillian Conoley
 * Jayne Cortez


 * Robert Creeley
 * Carl Dennis
 * William Dickey
 * Robert Dow
 * Thomas Sayers Ellis
 * Irving Feldman
 * Herman Fong
 * Dick Gallup
 * Martin Galvin
 * Amy Gerstler
 * Allen Ginsberg
 * Dana Gioia
 * Elton Glaser
 * Kate Gleason
 * Albert Goldbarth


 * Jorie Graham
 * Donald Hall
 * Daniel Halpern
 * Robert Hass
 * Bob Hicok
 * Paul Hoover
 * Christine Hume
 * Harry Humes
 * Don Hymans
 * Lawson Fusao Inada
 * Richard Jackson
 * Gray Jacobik
 * George Kalamaras
 * Jennifer L. Knox
 * Philip Kobylarz


 * Yusef Komunyakaa
 * Elizabeth Kostova
 * Denise Levertov
 * Larry Levis
 * Matthew Lippman
 * Beth Lisick
 * Khaled Mattawa
 * William Matthews
 * Josip Novakovich
 * Geoffrey Nutter
 * Catie Rosemurgy
 * Clare Rossini
 * Mary Ruefle
 * Hillel Schwartz
 * Maureen Seaton


 * Vijay Seshadri
 * Steven Sherrill
 * Charles Simic
 * Charlie Smith
 * Leon Stokesbury
 * Mark Strand
 * Jack Turner
 * Karen Volkman
 * Derek Walcott
 * Rosanna Warren
 * Lewis Warsh
 * Terence Winch
 * Eve Wood
 * Charles Wright
 * Dean Young

Other in English

 * Margaret Avison, Not Yet but Still, Australia

Works published in other languages
Listed by nation where the work was first published and again by the poet's native land, if different; substantially revised works listed separately:

France

 * Olivier Barbarant, Aragon: la mémoire et l'excès, publisher: Editions Champ Vallon, ISBN 978-2-87673-226-1
 * Yves Bonnefoy, L'Encore Aveugle,
 * Seyhmus Dagtekin, Artères-solaires, publisher: L'Harmattan; Kurdish Turkish poet writing in French, living in and published in France

Canada, in French

 * Suzanne Jacob, La part de feu, Montréal: Boréal, winner of the prix de la Société Radio-Canada, and prix du Gouverneur général
 * Pierre Nepveu, Romans-fleuves, Montréal: Le Noroît

Hebrew

 * Aharon Shabtai, Be-xodesh May ha-nifla’ ("In the Wonderful Month of May")
 * Rami Saari, Maslul Ha-k'ev Ha-no"az ("The Route of the Bold Pain")

India
In each section, listed in alphabetical order by first name:

Bengali

 * Joy Goswami, Kabita-Songroho, Vol. 2, Kolkata: Ananda Publishers, ISBN 81-7215-750-9 (third reprint in 2002)
 * Nirendranath Chakravarti, Shondharaater Kobita, Kolkata: Ananda Publishers
 * Udaya Narayana Singh, Ashru o Parihaas, Kolkata: Pritoniya
 * Subrata Bandyopadhyay, Saodāgara o The final judgement ("Saudagar and the Final Judgement"), Kalakata: De'ja Pābaliśiṃ

Other in India

 * Jiban Narah, Dhou Khela Loralir San, Guwahati, Assam: Nibedon; Indian, Assamese-language
 * Jayant Kaikini, Neelimale, Bangalore: Patrike Prakashana, Indian, Kannada-language poet, short-story writer, and screenwriter
 * K. G. Sankara Pillai, K.G. Shankara Pillayude Kavithakal 1969-1996, Kottayam, Kerala: D C Books; Malayalam-language
 * K. Siva Reddy, Naa Kalala Nadi Anchuna, Hyderabad: Jhari Poetry Circle; Telugu-language
 * Kanaka Ha Ma, Papanashini, Puttur, Karnataka: Kannada Sangha; Kannada language
 * Namdeo Dhasal, Andhale Shatak, Mumbai: Ambedkara Prabodhini; Marathi-language

Poland

 * Stanisław Barańczak, Zimy i podroze ("Winter and Journeys"), Krakow: Wydawnictwo Literackie
 * Ewa Lipska, Ludzie dla poczatkujacych, ("People for Beginners"); Poznan: a5
 * Tomasz Różycki, Vaterland, Łódź: Stowarzyszenie Literackie im. K.K. Baczyńskiego
 * Piotr Sommer, Nowe stosunki wyrazów. Wiersze z lat siedemdziesiątych i osiemdziesiątych
 * Wisława Szymborska: Sto wierszy - sto pociech ("100 Poems - 100 Happinesses")
 * Eugeniusz Tkaczyszyn-Dycki, Liber mortuorum

Spain

 * Matilde Camus, Mundo interior ("Inner World")

Other

 * Mario Benedetti, La vida ese paréntesis, Uruguay
 * Attilio Bertolucci, La lucertola di Casarola, previously unpublished poems, many written in his youth; Italy
 * Christoph Buchwald, general editor, and Ror Wolf, guest editor, Jahrbuch der Lyrik 1997/98 ("Poetry Yearbook 1997/98"), publisher: Beck; anthology
 * Chen Kehua, Bie ai moshengren ("Don’t Make Love to Strangers") Chinese (Taiwan)
 * Alexander Mezhirov:
 * Позёмка ("Drifting"), Russia
 * Apologii︠a︡ t︠s︡irka: kniga novykh stikhov ("Apologia of the Circus"), including a version of "Blizzard", St. Petersburg, Russia
 * Wang Xiaoni, Wode zhili baozhe wo de huo ("My paper wraps my fire"), China

Australia

 * C. J. Dennis Prize for Poetry: Les Murray, Subhuman Redneck Poems
 * Dinny O'Hearn Poetry Prize: Joint winners
 * Dragons in their Pleasant Places by Peter Porter
 * The Wild Reply by Emma Lew
 * Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry: Anthony Lawrence, The Viewfinder
 * Mary Gilmore Prize: Emma Lew - The Wild Reply

Canada

 * Gerald Lampert Award: Marilyn Dumont, A Really Good Brown Girl
 * Archibald Lampman Award: Diana Brebner, Flora & Fauna
 * 1997 Governor General's Awards: Dionne Brand, Land to Light On (English); Pierre Nepveu, Romans-fleuves (French)
 * Pat Lowther Award: Marilyn Bowering, Autobiography
 * Prix Alain-Grandbois: Claude Beausoleil, Grand hôtel des étrangers
 * Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize: Margo Button, The Unhinging of Wings
 * Prix Émile-Nelligan: Patrick Lafontaine, L’Ambition du vide

India

 * Sahitya Akademi Award : Leeladhar Jagudi for Anubhav Ke Aakash Mein Chaand
 * Poetry Society India National Poetry Competition : Ranjit Hoskote for Portrait of a Lady

New Zealand

 * Montana New Zealand Book Awards, First Book Award for Poetry: Diane Brown, Before the Divorce We Go To Disneyland, Tandem Press

United Kingdom

 * Cholmondeley Award: Alison Brackenbury, Gillian Clarke, Tony Curtis, Anne Stevenson
 * Eric Gregory Award: Matthew Clegg, Sarah Corbett, Polly Clark, Tim Kendall, Graham Nelson, Matthew Welton
 * Forward Poetry Prize Best Collection: Jamie McKendrick, The Marble Fly (Oxford University Press)
 * Forward Poetry Prize Best First Collection: Robin Robertson, A Painted Field (Picador)
 * T. S. Eliot Prize (United Kingdom and Ireland): Don Paterson, God's Gift to Women
 * Whitbread Award for poetry and book of the year: Ted Hughes, Tales from Ovid
 * National Poetry Competition : Neil Rollinson for The Constellations

United States

 * Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize: Richard Blanco, City of a Hundred Fires
 * Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry: Fred Chappell
 * American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal in Poetry, John Ashbery
 * AML Award for poetry to Susan Elizabeth Howe for Stone Spirits
 * Bernard F. Connors Prize for Poetry: John Drury, "Burning the Aspern Papers"
 * Bollingen Prize: Gary Snyder
 * National Book Award for poetry: William Meredith, Effort at Speech: New & Selected Poems
 * Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress: Robert Pinsky appointed
 * Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Lisel Mueller: Live Together: New and Selected Poems
 * Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize: William Matthews
 * Wallace Stevens Award: Anthony Hecht
 * Whiting Awards: Connie Deanovich, Forrest Gander, Jody Gladding, Mark Turpin
 * Fellowship of the Academy of American Poets: John Haines
 * North Carolina Poet Laureate: Fred Chappell appointed.

Deaths
Birth years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
 * January 19 – James Dickey, 73 (born 1923), American
 * April 5 – Allen Ginsberg, 70 (born 1926), of liver cancer, American
 * April 27 – Dulce María Loynaz, 94 (born 1902), Cuban
 * May 15 – Laurie Lee, 82, English poet, novelist and screenwriter
 * August 27 – Johannes Edfelt, 92, Swedish
 * October 19 – Stella Sierra, 80, (born 1917), Panamanian
 * November 12:
 * James Laughlin, 83, American poet, publisher and man of letters
 * William Matthews, 55, American poet and essayist, of a heart attack
 * November 17 – David Ignatow, 83, American poet
 * November 30 – Kathy Acker, 53, American postmodernist experimental novelist and punk poet
 * December 13 – Claude Roy, pen name of Claude Orland (born 1915), French poet, novelist, essayist, art critic and journalist; an activist in the Communist Party until his expulsion in 1956
 * December 20 – Denise Levertov, 74, of lymphoma