Robert L. Hass (born March 1, 1941) is an American poet. He served as Poet Laureate of the United States from 1995 to 1997. He won the 2007 National Book Award and shared the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for the collection Time and Materials: Poems 1997–2005. In 2014 he was awarded the Wallace Stevens Award from the Academy of American Poets.

Life

Hass's works are well known for their West Coast subjects and attitudes. He was born in San Francisco and grew up in San Rafael.

Hass is married to the poet and antiwar activist Brenda Hillman, who is a professor at Saint Mary's College of California.

Poetry

Hass's poems tend to vary in structure as he alternates between prose-like blocks and free verse. His poems have been said to have a stylistic clarity, seen in his simple, clear language and precise imagery. His collection Praise features themes of seasons, nature, location, and transformation, with a running motif of blackberries. Poet Stanley Kunitz said of Hass's work, "Reading a poem by Robert Hass is like stepping into the ocean when the temperature of the water is not much different from that of the air. You scarcely know, until you feel the undertow tug at you, that you have entered into another element."

The January 2017 "Gift Horse" episode of the TV series Madam Secretary alludes to Hass. At a presidential inauguration, the poet laureate character ("Roland Hobbs") recites a poem that describes "the privilege of being", an allusion to Hass's 1999 poem of that title.

Activism

Hass has actively promoted ecoliteracy. In 1995 he began working with writer and environmentalist Pamela Michael on a program that encourages "children to make art and poetry about their watersheds" and fosters interdisciplinary environmental education. In April 1996, when he was poet laureate, he organized a six-day conference at the Library of Congress that brought together American nature writers to celebrate writing, the natural world, and community.

On November 9, 2011, while Hass was participating in an Occupy movement demonstration at UC Berkeley called Occupy Cal, a police officer hit him in the ribs with a baton.

Awards and honors

Literary awards

{| class="wikitable sortable"

! Year

! Work

! Award

! Category

! Result

! Ref

|-

! 1972

| Field Guide

| Yale Series of Younger Poets

| —

|

|

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! 1979

| Praise

| William Carlos Williams Award

| —

|

|

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! 1984

| Twentieth Century Pleasures

| National Book Critics Circle Award

| Criticism

|

|

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! 1989

| Human Wishes

| National Book Critics Circle Award

| Poetry

|

|

|-

!

| rowspan="2" |Sun Under Wood

|National Book Award

|Poetry

|

|

|-

! 1996

| National Book Critics Circle Award

| Poetry

|

|

|-

! 2007

| rowspan="2" | Time and Materials

| National Book Award

| Poetry

|

|

|-

!2018

|A Little Book on Form: An Exploration into the Formal Imagination of Poetry

|Truman Capote Award for Literary Criticism

|—

|

|

|}

Honors

  • The Frost Place poet in residence (1978)
  • MacArthur Fellowship, 1984
  • Manhae Prize co-winner, 2009
  • Wallace Stevens Award, 2014

Published works

Poetry

Criticism

Contributions

Translations

  • The Separate Notebooks, Czesław Miłosz (translated by Robert Hass and Robert Pinsky with the author and Renata Gorczynski), New York: Ecco Press, 1984,
  • Unattainable Earth, Czesław Miłosz (translated by author and Robert Hass), New York: Ecco Press, 1986,
  • Provinces, Czesław Miłosz (translated by author and Robert Hass), Hopewell, NJ: Ecco Press, 1991,
  • The Essential Haiku: Versions of Bashō, Buson, and Issa, Bashō Matsuo, Buson Yosano, Issa Kobayashi (edited with verse translation by Robert Hass), Hopewell, NJ: Ecco Press, 1994,
  • Facing the River: new poems, Czesław Miłosz (translated by author and Robert Hass), Hopewell, NJ: Ecco Press, 1995,
  • Road-Side Dog, Czesław Miłosz (translated by author and Robert Hass), New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1998,
  • Treatise on Poetry, Czesław Miłosz (translated by author and Robert Hass), New York: Ecco Press, 2001,
  • Second Space: new poems, Czesław Miłosz (translated by author and Robert Hass), New York: Ecco Press, 2004,
  • The Essential Neruda: Selected Poems, includes five translations by Robert Hass, San Francisco: City Lights 2004,

References

  • Poems by Robert Hass and biography at PoetryFoundation.org
  • Hass's Academy of American Poets page
  • "Robert Hass: Online Interviews", Sarah Pollock, Modern American Poetry
  • Hass pays tribute to Griffin Trust Lifetime Recognition Award recipient Robin Blaser (audio clip)
  • Two poems (Meditations at Lagunitas and Misery and Splendor ) from the Robert Hass page, courtesy of UIUC.
  • "The Bard of Berkeley," Wall Street Journal, June 29, 2009
  • , review of The Apple Trees at Olema in the Oxonian Review
  • 'The Temptations of Art', review of "The Apple Trees at Olema" in The New Republic