Anne Carson (June 21, 1950) is a Canadian poet, essayist, translator, and a professor of Classics and comparative literature at the University of Michigan. Carson lived in Montreal for several years and taught at McGill University. Reticent about her private life, the biography published in current editions of her books is titled, Anne Carson lives in Canada.

Life and work

Though distinguished, Carson's academic training did not run a straight path. The fascination with classical literature which dominates her work began to take root in high school. There, a Latin instructor introduced her to the world and language of Ancient Greece and tutored the future poet privately ^[1]. Enrolling at St. Michael's College at the University of Toronto, she left twice--at the end of her first and second years. Carson, disconcerted by curricular constraints (particularly by a required course on Milton), retired to the world of graphic arts for a short time ^[2]. She did eventually return to the University of Toronto where she completed her B.A. in 1974, her M.A. in 1975 and her Ph.D. in 1981 ^[3].

A professor of the classics, with background in classical languages, comparative literature, anthropology, history, and commercial art, Carson blends ideas and themes from many fields in her writing. She frequently references, modernizes, and translates Greek mythology. She has published ten books as of 2006, all of which blend the forms of poetry, essay, prose, criticism, translation, dramatic dialogue, fiction, and non-fiction.

Anne Carson was an Anna-Maria Kellen Fellow at the American Academy in Berlin, Germany, for Fall 2007.

The Classic Stage Company, a New York-based theatre company, will produce three of Carson's translations: Aeschylus' Agamemnon; Sophocles' Electra; and Euripides' Orestes (as The Oresteia), in repertory, in the 2008/2009 season.

Selected works

• Odi et Amo Ergo Sum (1986) PhD Dissertation, University of Toronto
• Eros the Bittersweet (1986) Princeton University Press
• Glass, Irony, and God (1992) New Directions Publishing Company
• Short Talks (1992) Brick Books
• Plainwater (1995) Knopf
• Autobiography of Red: A Novel in Verse (1998) Knopf
• Economy of the Unlost: Reading Simonides of Ceos with Paul Celan (1999) Princeton University Press
• Men in the Off Hours (2001) Knopf
• Electra (translation) (2001) Oxford
• The Beauty of the Husband (2002) Knopf
• If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho (2002) Knopf
• Wonderwater (Alice Offshore) (volume two, a collaboration with Roni Horn) (2004) Steidl
• Decreation: Poetry, Essays, Opera (2005) Knopf
• Grief Lessons: Four Plays by Euripides (translation) (2006) New York Review Books Classics

Selected awards and honors

• Lannan Literary Award (1996)
• Pushcart Prize (1997)
• Guggenheim Fellowship (1998)
• MacArthur Fellowship (2000)
• Griffin Poetry Prize (2001) for Men in the Off Hours
• T. S. Eliot Prize (2001) for The Beauty of the Husband

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Anne Carson

• Poems by Anne Carson at PoetryFoundation.org
• Griffin Poetry Prize biography
• Anne Carson's entry in The Canadian Encyclopedia
• Griffin Poetry Prize reading, including audio clip
• Hermetic Hotties/What is Anne Carson doing on The L Word- by Meghan O'Rourke, Slate
• Criticism of Carson's poetry in "Subduing the reader" by Laurie Smith in Magma, No. 23, Summer 2002
• Anne Carson Biography by Ian Rae.
• Classic Carson by Val Ross in U of T Magazine, Spring 2001.
• Anne Carson interview on KCRW's "Bookworm," August 7, 1997, discussing the roots of her writing, particularly in "Plainwater" and "Glass, Irony and God"

References