Mary Jane Oliver (September 10, 1935 – January 17, 2019) was an American poet who won the Pulitzer Prize in 1984 and the National Book Award in 1992. She found inspiration for her work in nature and had a lifelong habit of solitary walks in the wild. Her poetry is characterized by wonderment at the natural environment, vivid imagery, and unadorned language. In 2007, she was declared the best-selling poet in the United States.

Early life

Mary Oliver was born to Edward William and Helen M. Oliver on September 10, 1935, in Maple Heights, Ohio, a semi-rural suburb of Cleveland.</blockquote> In a 2011 interview with Maria Shriver, Oliver said she had been sexually abused as a child and had experienced recurring nightmares. Oliver called her family dysfunctional, adding that though her childhood was very hard, writing helped her create her own world.

Oliver began writing poetry at the age of 14. She graduated from the local high school in Maple Heights. In the summer of 1951, at age 15, she attended the National Music Camp at Interlochen, Michigan, now known as Interlochen Arts Camp, where she was in the percussion section of the National High School Orchestra. At 17, she visited the home of the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Edna St. Vincent Millay, in Austerlitz, New York, where she formed a friendship with the late poet's sister Norma. Oliver spent the next six to seven years at the estate helping Norma organize Edna St. Vincent Millay's papers.

Oliver studied at Ohio State University and Vassar College in the mid-1950s but did not receive a degree at either college. Her first collection of poems, No Voyage, and Other Poems, was published in 1963, when she was 28. During the early 1980s, Oliver taught at Case Western Reserve University. Her fifth collection of poetry, American Primitive, won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1984. Nature stirred her creativity, and Oliver, an avid walker, often pursued inspiration on foot. Her poems are filled with imagery from her daily walks near her home: Oliver said her favorite poets were Walt Whitman, Rumi, Hafez, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and John Keats.

Oliver was also compared to Emily Dickinson, with whom she shared an affinity for solitude and inner monologues. Her poetry combines dark introspection with joyous release. Though criticized for writing poetry that assumes a close relationship between women and nature, she found that the self is only strengthened through immersion in the natural environment. Oliver is also known for her straightforward language and accessible themes. The Harvard Review describes her work as an antidote to "inattention and the baroque conventions of our social and professional lives. She is a poet of wisdom and generosity whose vision allows us to look intimately at a world not of our making."

Personal life

On a visit to the town of Austerlitz, New York in the late 1950s, Oliver met photographer Molly Malone Cook, who became her partner for over 40 years. Of Provincetown, she said: "I too fell in love with the town, that marvelous convergence of land and water; Mediterranean light; fishermen who made their living by hard and difficult work from frighteningly small boats; and, both residents and sometime visitors, the many artists and writers.[...] M. and I decided to stay." Oliver died of lymphoma on January 17, 2019, at the age of 83.

Critical reception

In the Women's Review of Books, Maxine Kumin called Oliver an "indefatigable guide to the natural world, particularly to its lesser-known aspects." In The Harvard Gay & Lesbian Review, Sue Russell wrote, "Oliver will never be a balladeer of contemporary lesbian life in the vein of Marilyn Hacker, or an important political thinker like Adrienne Rich; but the fact that she chooses not to write from a similar political or narrative stance makes her all the more valuable to our collective culture."

Selected awards and honors

  • 1969/70 Shelley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America.
  • 1991 L.L. Winship/PEN New England Award for House of Light
  • 1992 National Book Award for Poetry for New and Selected Poems
  • 1998 Lannan Literary Award for poetry
  • 2007 Honorary Doctorate Dartmouth College
  • 2012 Goodreads Choice Award for Best Poetry for A Thousand Mornings

Works

Poetry collections

  • 1963 No Voyage, and Other Poems Dent (New York, NY), expanded edition, Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA), 1965.
  • 1972 The River Styx, Ohio, and Other Poems Harcourt (New York, NY)
  • 1978 The Night Traveler Bits Press
  • 1978 Sleeping in the Forest Ohio University (a 12-page chapbook, p.&nbsp;49–60 in The Ohio Review—Vol. 19, No. 1 [Winter 1978])
  • 1979 Twelve Moons Little, Brown (Boston, MA),
  • 1983 American Primitive Little, Brown (Boston, MA)
  • 1986 <!-- quote=Mary Oliver. --> Dream Work Atlantic Monthly Press (Boston, MA)
  • 1987 Provincetown Appletree Alley, limited edition with woodcuts by Barnard Taylor
  • 1990 House of Light Beacon Press (Boston, MA)
  • 1992 New and Selected Poems [volume one] Beacon Press (Boston, MA),
  • 1994 White Pine: Poems and Prose Poems Harcourt (San Diego, CA)
  • 1995 Blue Pastures Harcourt (New York, NY)
  • 1997 West Wind: Poems and Prose Poems Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA)
  • 1999 Winter Hours: Prose, Prose Poems, and Poems Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA)
  • 2000 The Leaf and the Cloud Da Capo (Cambridge, Massachusetts), (prose poem)
  • 2002 What Do We Know Da Capo (Cambridge, Massachusetts)
  • 2003 Owls and Other Fantasies: poems and essays Beacon (Boston, MA)
  • 2004 Why I Wake Early: New Poems Beacon (Boston, MA)
  • 2004 Blue Iris: Poems and Essays Beacon (Boston, MA)
  • 2004 Wild geese: selected poems, Bloodaxe,
  • 2005 New and Selected Poems, volume two Beacon (Boston, MA)
  • 2005 At Blackwater Pond: Mary Oliver Reads Mary Oliver (audio cd)
  • 2006 Thirst: Poems (Boston, MA)
  • 2007 Our World with photographs by Molly Malone Cook, Beacon (Boston, MA)
  • 2008 The Truro Bear and Other Adventures: Poems and Essays , Beacon Press,
  • 2008 Red Bird Beacon (Boston, MA)
  • 2009 Evidence Beacon (Boston, MA)
  • 2010 Swan: Poems and Prose Poems (Boston, MA)
  • 2012 A Thousand Mornings Penguin (New York, NY)
  • 2013 Dog Songs Penguin Press (New York, NY)
  • 2014 Blue Horses Penguin Press (New York, NY)
  • 2015 Felicity Penguin Press (New York, NY)
  • 2017 Devotions The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver Penguin Press (New York, NY)

Non-fiction books and other collections

  • 1994 A Poetry Handbook Harcourt (San Diego, CA)
  • 1998 <!-- quote=Mary Oliver. --> Rules for the Dance: A Handbook for Writing and Reading Metrical Verse Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA)
  • 2004 Long Life: Essays and Other Writings Da Capo (Cambridge, Massachusetts)
  • 2016 Upstream: Selected Essays Penguin (New York, NY)

Works in translation

Catalan

  • 2018 Ocell Roig Translated by C. Oproae, Godall Edicions (Barcelona)

German

  • 2023 Sag mir, was hast du vor mit deinem wilden, kostbaren Leben: Gesammelte Gedichte Translated by J. Brôcan, Diogenes Verlag AG (Zurich)

See also

  • Poppies, poem by Mary Oliver
  • In Blackwater Woods, poem by Mary Oliver
  • Lesbian poetry

References

Sources

  • Bond, Diane. "The Language of Nature in the Poetry of Mary Oliver." Women's Studies 21:1 (1992), p.&nbsp;1.
  • Graham, Vicki. "'Into the Body of Another': Mary Oliver and the Poetics of Becoming Other." Papers on Language and Literature, 30:4 (Fall 1994), pp.&nbsp;352–353, pp.&nbsp;366–368.
  • McNew, Janet. "Mary Oliver and the Tradition of Romantic Nature Poetry". Contemporary Literature, 30:1 (Spring 1989).
  • "Oliver, Mary." American Environmental Leaders: From Colonial Times to the Present, Anne Becher, and Joseph Richey, Grey House Publishing, 2nd edition, 2008. Credo Reference.
  • Russell, Sue. "Mary Oliver: The Poet and the Persona." The Harvard Gay & Lesbian Review, 4:4 (Fall 1997), pp.&nbsp;21–22.
  • "1992." The Chronology of American Literature, edited by Daniel S. Burt, Houghton Mifflin, 1st edition, 2004. Credo Reference.
  • Official website
  • Mary Oliver at the Academy of American Poets
  • Biography and poems of Mary Oliver at the Poetry Foundation.
  • Interview with Krista Tippett, "On Being" radio program, broadcast 5 February 2015.