View source for John Ashbery

{{Short description|American poet (1927–2017)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=September 2020}}
{{Infobox writer
| name         = John Ashbery
| image        = John Ashbery (1975, crop) (2).jpg
| caption      = Ashbery in 1975
| birth_name   = John Lawrence Ashbery
| birth_date   = {{birth date|mf=yes|1927|7|28}}
| birth_place  = [[Rochester, New York]], U.S.
| death_date   = {{death date and age|mf=yes|2017|9|3|1927|7|28}}
| death_place  = [[Hudson, New York]], U.S.
| occupation   = Poet, professor, and art critic
| period       = 1949–2017
| movement     = [[Surrealism]], [[New York School (art)|The New York School]], [[Postmodernism]]
| education    = [[Harvard University]] ([[Bachelor of Arts|BA]])<br>[[New York University]]<br>[[Columbia University]] ([[Master of Arts|MA]])
| notable_works = ''[[Self-portrait in a Convex Mirror (book)|Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror]]''
| awards       = [[MacArthur Fellowship]], [[Pulitzer Prize for Poetry]], [[National Book Award]], [[National Book Critics Circle Award]], [[Guggenheim Fellowship]]
| spouse       = David Kermani
| signature    = John Ashbery signature.svg
}}
'''John Lawrence Ashbery'''<ref name=AAAS>{{cite web|title=Book of Members, 1780–2010: Chapter A|url=http://www.amacad.org/publications/BookofMembers/ChapterA.pdf|publisher=American Academy of Arts and Sciences|access-date=April 25, 2011}}</ref> (July 28, 1927 – September 3, 2017) was an American [[poet]] and [[art critic]].<ref name=NYT-MTV>{{cite news | first= Melena| last= Ryzik| title=An 80-Year-Old Poet for the MTV Generation | url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/27/books/27laur.html?hp | work=[[New York Times]] | date=August 27, 2007 | access-date=August 21, 2007 }}</ref>

Ashbery is considered the most influential American poet of his time. [[Oxford University]] literary critic [[John Bayley (writer)|John Bayley]] wrote that Ashbery "sounded, in poetry, the standard tones of the age."<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1991/08/15/richly-flows-contingency/|title=Richly Flows Contingency|last=Bayley|first=John| author-link=John Bayley (writer)| journal=[[The New York Review of Books]] |date=August 15, 1991|access-date=September 10, 2019|language=en|issn=0028-7504}}</ref> Langdon Hammer, chair of the English Department at [[Yale University]], wrote in 2008, "No figure looms so large in American poetry over the past 50 years as John Ashbery" and "No American poet has had a larger, more diverse vocabulary, not [[Walt Whitman| Whitman]], not [[Ezra Pound| Pound]]."<ref>Hammer, Langdon, [https://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/books/review/Hammer-t.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&ref=books&pagewanted=print "‘But I Digress’"], review of ''Notes from the Air: Selected Later Poems'', by John Ashbery, ''[[New York Times Book Review]]'', April 20, 2008, accessed same day.</ref> [[Stephanie Burt]], a poet and [[Harvard]] professor of English, has compared Ashbery to [[T. S. Eliot]], calling Ashbery "the last figure whom half the English-language poets alive thought a great model, and the other half thought incomprehensible".<ref>{{cite news|url=http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/the_tls/article3626601.ece|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080904233641/http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/the_tls/article3626601.ece|url-status=dead|archive-date=September 4, 2008|title=John Ashbery a poet for our times|last=Burt|first=Stephen|date=March 26, 2008|work=[[The Times]]|access-date=May 6, 2010|location=London}}</ref>

Ashbery published more than 20 volumes of poetry. Among other awards, he received the [[Pulitzer Prize for Poetry]], [[National Book Award]], [[National Book Critics Circle Award]] for his collection ''[[Self-portrait in a Convex Mirror (book)|Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror]]'' (1975).<ref name=":Poetry Foundation">{{cite web| title=John Ashbery| website=[[Poetry Foundation]]| url=https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/john-ashbery}}</ref> In 2007, he became the first living poet to be anthologized by the [[Library of America]]. Renowned for its postmodern complexity and opacity, his work still proves controversial. Ashbery said he wished his work to be accessible to as many people as possible, not a private dialogue with himself.<ref name="NYT-MTV" /><ref>{{cite news| last=Simon| first=Scott| author-link=Scott Simon| title=A Conversation with Poet John Ashbery| url=https://www.npr.org/2005/03/19/4542617/a-conversation-with-poet-john-ashbery| date=March 19, 2005| work=[[National Public Radio]]}}</ref> He also joked that some critics still view him as "a harebrained, homegrown surrealist whose poetry defies even the rules and logic of [[Surrealism]]."<ref>Ashbery, John. "On Elizabeth Bishop." ''Selected Prose''. 2005.</ref> He reflected: "I’m not very good at explaining my work... I'm unable to do so because I feel that my poetry is the explanation. The explanation of what? Of my thought, whatever that is. As I see it, my thought is both poetry and the attempt to explain that poetry; the two cannot be disentangled."<ref>{{cite web| title=John Ashbery| website=[[Library of America]]| url=https://www.loa.org/writers/239-john-ashbery/}}</ref>

==Life==
Ashbery was born in [[Rochester, Monroe County, New York|Rochester]],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/238 |title=John Ashbery |publisher=[[Academy of American Poets]] |access-date=August 26, 2014|date=February 4, 2014 }}</ref> [[New York (state)|New York]], the son of Helen ({{née|Lawrence}}), a biology teacher, and Chester Frederick Ashbery, a farmer.<ref name="CurryRamm2007">{{cite book|editor1-last=Curry|editor1-first=Jennifer|editor2-last=Ramm|editor2-first=David|editor3-last=Rich|editor3-first=Mari|title=World Authors, 2000–2005|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lqsjAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA14|year=2007|publisher=[[H. W. Wilson Company|H.W. Wilson]]|isbn=978-0-8242-1077-9|pages=14}}</ref> He was raised on a farm near [[Lake Ontario]]; his brother died when they were children.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20340 |title=Video: The Other Twenty-Three Hours |year=2008 |publisher=[[Academy of American Poets]] |access-date=August 26, 2014 |archive-date=June 22, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190622071014/http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20340 |url-status=dead }}</ref> Ashbery was educated at [[Deerfield Academy]], an all-boys school, where he read such poets as [[W. H. Auden]] and [[Dylan Thomas]] and began writing poetry. Two of his poems were published in ''[[Poetry (magazine)|Poetry]]'' magazine by a classmate who had submitted them under his own name, without Ashbery's knowledge or permission.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.poetryfoundation.org/collections/144210/john-ashbery|title=Remembering John Ashbery|date=September 11, 2017|publisher=Poetry Foundation|language=en-us|access-date=September 12, 2017}}</ref> Ashbery also published a piece of short fiction and a handful of poems—including a [[sonnet]] about his frustrated love for a fellow student—in the school newspaper, the ''Deerfield Scroll''. His first ambition was to be a painter: from the age of 11 until he was 15, Ashbery took weekly classes at the art museum in Rochester.

[[File:John Ashbery by David Shankbone.jpg|thumb|Ashbery at a 2007 tribute to [[W. H. Auden]] at [[Cooper Union]] in [[New York City]]]]
Ashbery graduated in 1949 with an A.B., ''[[cum laude]]'', from [[Harvard|Harvard College]], where he was a member of the ''[[Harvard Advocate]]'', the university's literary magazine, and the [[Signet Society]]. He wrote his senior thesis on the poetry of W. H. Auden. At Harvard he befriended fellow writers [[Kenneth Koch]], [[Barbara Epstein]], [[V. R. Lang]], [[Frank O'Hara]] and [[Edward Gorey]], and was a classmate of [[Robert Creeley]], [[Robert Bly]] and [[Peter Davison (poet)|Peter Davison]]. Ashbery went on to study briefly at [[New York University]] before receiving an M.A. from [[Columbia University]] in 1951.

After working as a [[copywriter]] in [[New York City|New York]] from 1951 to 1955,<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|url=http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/38138/John-Ashbery |title=John Ashbery |encyclopedia=[[Encyclopædia Britannica]] |access-date=August 26, 2014}}</ref> from the mid-1950s, when he received a [[Fulbright Program|Fulbright Fellowship]], through 1965, Ashbery lived in [[France]]. He was an editor of the 12 issues of ''Art and Literature'' (1964–67) and the ''New Poetry'' issue of [[Harry Mathews]]' ''Locus Solus'' (# 3/4; 1962). To make ends meet he translated French murder mysteries, served as the art editor for the European edition of the ''[[New York Herald Tribune]]'' and was an art critic for ''Art International'' (1960–65) and a Paris correspondent for ''[[ARTnews]]'' (1963–66), when Thomas Hess took over as editor. During this period he lived with the French poet [[Pierre Martory]], whose books ''Every Question but One'' (1990), ''The Landscape is behind the Door'' (1994) and ''The Landscapist'' he translated (2008), as he did [[Arthur Rimbaud]] (''Illuminations''), [[Max Jacob]] (''The Dice Cup''), [[Pierre Reverdy]] (''Haunted House''), and many titles by [[Raymond Roussel]]. After returning to the United States, he continued his career as an [[art critic]] for ''[[New York (magazine)|New York]]'' and ''[[Newsweek]]'' magazines while also serving on the editorial board of ''ARTnews'' until 1972. Several years later, he began a stint as an editor at ''[[Partisan Review]]'', serving from 1976 to 1980.

During the fall of 1963, Ashbery became acquainted with [[Andy Warhol]] at a scheduled poetry reading at the [[Literary Theatre]] in New York. He had previously written favorable reviews of Warhol's art. That same year he reviewed Warhol's ''[[Flowers (Warhol)|Flowers]]'' exhibition at Galerie [[Ileana Sonnabend]] in Paris, describing Warhol's visit to Paris as "the biggest transatlantic fuss since [[Oscar Wilde]] brought culture to [[Buffalo, New York|Buffalo]] in the nineties". Ashbery returned to New York near the end of 1965 and was welcomed with a large party at [[the Factory]]. He became close friends with poet [[Gerard Malanga]], Warhol's assistant, on whom he had an important influence as a poet. In 1967 his poem ''Europe'' was used as the central text in [[Eric Salzman|Eric Salzman's]] ''Foxes and Hedgehogs'' as part of the ''New Image of Sound'' series at [[Hunter College]], conducted by [[Dennis Russell Davies]]. When the poet sent Salzman ''Three Madrigals'' in 1968, the composer featured them in the seminal ''Nude Paper Sermon'', released by [[Nonesuch Records]] in 1989.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.flowchartfoundation.org/tc/advanced_search.php?reorder=yes&sortfield=publicationdate&sorttype=desc&se_type=EX&pg=20&/|title=Ashbery Research Center archive|access-date=September 3, 2017|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://archive.today/20141214045519/http://www.flowchartfoundation.org/tc/advanced_search.php?reorder=yes&sortfield=publicationdate&sorttype=desc&se_type=EX&pg=20&/|archive-date=December 14, 2014}}</ref>

In the early 1970s, Ashbery began teaching at [[Brooklyn College]], where his students included poet [[John Yau]]. He was elected a Fellow of the [[American Academy of Arts and Sciences]] in 1983.<ref name=AAAS /> In the 1980s, he moved to [[Bard College]], where he was the Charles P. Stevenson, Jr., Professor of Languages and Literature, until 2008, when he retired but continued to win awards, present readings, and work with graduate and undergraduates at many other institutions. He was the [[List of U.S. states' Poets Laureate|poet laureate of New York State]] from 2001 to 2003,<ref>{{cite web|title=New York|url=https://www.loc.gov/rr/main/poets/newyork.html|work=US State Poet Laureates|publisher=Library of Congress|access-date=May 8, 2012}}</ref> and also served for many years as a chancellor of the [[Academy of American Poets]]. He served on the contributing editorial board of the literary journal ''[[Conjunctions (journal)|Conjunctions]]''. In 2008 Ashbery was named the first poet laureate of [[MtvU]], a division of [[MTV]] broadcast to U.S. college campuses, with excerpts from his poems featured in 18 promotional spots and the works in their entirety on the broadcaster's website.<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://mobile.nytimes.com/2007/08/27/books/27laur.html | title=An 80-Year-Old Poet for the MTV Generation| newspaper=[[The New York Times]]| date=August 27, 2007| last1=Ryzik| first1=Melena}}</ref>
[[File:Paul Auster John Ashbery BBF 2010 Shankbone.jpg|thumb|[[Paul Auster]] and Ashbery discussing their work at the 2010 [[Brooklyn Book Festival]]]]
Ashbery was a Millet Writing Fellow at [[Wesleyan University]] in 2010, and participated in Wesleyan's Distinguished Writers Series.<ref>[http://wesleyanargus.com/2010/02/19/john-ashbery-visits-presents-his-poetry/ John Ashbery Visits, Presents His Poetry], Wesleyanargus. By Marjorie Rivera, Contributing Writer. February 19, 2010. Retrieved October 14, 2012.</ref> He was a founding member of [[The Raymond Roussel Society]], with [[Miquel Barceló]], Joan Bofill-Amargós, [[Michel Butor]], Thor Halvorssen and Hermes Salceda.

Ashbery lived in New York City and [[Hudson, New York]], with his husband, David Kermani.<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/03/arts/john-ashbery-dead-prize-winning-poet.html | title=John Ashbery is Dead at 90; a Poetic Voice Often Echoed, Never Matched| newspaper=The New York Times| date=September 3, 2017| last1=Orr| first1=David| last2=Smith| first2=Dinitia}}</ref> He died of natural causes on September 3, 2017, at his home in Hudson, at the age of 90.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/john-ashbery-regarded-worlds-greatest-poets-dies-age-49599605|title=John Ashbery, regarded as one of the world's greatest poets, dies at age 90, his husband confirms|website=[[ABC News (United States)|ABC News]] |access-date=September 3, 2017|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170904013700/https://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/john-ashbery-regarded-worlds-greatest-poets-dies-age-49599605|archive-date=September 4, 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.sfchronicle.com/entertainment/article/John-Ashbery-celebrated-and-challenging-poet-12170718.php|title=John Ashbery, celebrated and challenging poet, dies at 90|access-date=September 3, 2017|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170904012957/http://www.sfchronicle.com/entertainment/article/John-Ashbery-celebrated-and-challenging-poet-12170718.php|archive-date=September 4, 2017}}</ref>

==Work==

Ashbery's long list of awards began with the [[Yale Younger Poets Prize]] in 1956. The selection, by [[W. H. Auden]], of Ashbery's first collection, ''Some Trees'', later caused some controversy.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://papercuts.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/jascha-kessler/|title=Jascha Kessler – ArtsBeat Blog – The New York Times|website=papercuts.blogs.nytimes.com|date=December 12, 2008 |access-date=September 3, 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/the_tls/article5235921.ece|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110615124742/http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/the_tls/article5235921.ece|url-status=dead|archive-date=June 15, 2011|title=The Times & The Sunday Times|website=[[The Times]]|access-date=September 3, 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/the_tls/article5278554.ece|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110615124913/http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/the_tls/article5278554.ece|url-status=dead|archive-date=June 15, 2011|title=The Times & The Sunday Times|website=[[The Times]]|access-date=September 3, 2017}}</ref> The volume was screened out in the contest's early stages and was given to Auden by [[Chester Kallman]] after Auden had decided not to award the prize that year because of the poor quality of the volumes he received.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_sFZAAAAMAAJ|title=After the Death of Poetry: Poet and Audience in Contemporary America|last=Shetley|first=Vernon Lionel|date=1993|publisher=Duke University Press|isbn=978-0-8223-1342-7|location=Durham & London|pages=109|language=en}}</ref> Ashbery's early work shows the influence of Auden, along with [[Wallace Stevens]], [[Boris Pasternak]], and many of the French [[surrealists]] (his translations from French literature are numerous), though he claimed in a 1956 letter to "hate all modern French poetry, except for [[Raymond Roussel]]" and to like his own "wildly inaccurate translations of some of the 20th-century ones, but not the originals".<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/nov/15/collected-french-translations-poetry-john-ashbery-review|title=Collected French Translations: Poetry by John Ashbery – review|last=McGuinness|first=Patrick|date=November 15, 2014|website=The Guardian|language=en|access-date=November 18, 2018}}</ref>

In the late 1950s, John Bernard Myers, co-owner of the [[Tibor de Nagy Gallery]], categorized Ashbery's [[avant-garde]] poetry and that of [[Kenneth Koch]], [[Frank O'Hara]], [[James Schuyler]], [[Barbara Guest]], [[Kenward Elmslie]] and others as a "[[New York School (art)|New York School]]", despite their very different styles.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://observer.com/2013/01/the-meaning-of-all-this-talking-to-john-ashbery-about-his-past-present-and-future/2/|title=The Meaning of All This: Talking to John Ashbery About His Past, Present and Future|date=January 1, 2013|work=Observer|access-date=November 18, 2018|language=en-US}}</ref> In 1953 Myers launched the magazine ''Semi-Colon'', in which New York School poets appeared amid an eclectic mix of authors, such as Auden, [[James Ingram Merrill|James Merrill]] and [[Saul Bellow]].<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SpxbAgAAQBAJ|title=Encyclopedia of the New York School Poets|last=Diggory|first=Terence|publisher=Infobase Learning|year=2013|isbn=978-1-4381-4066-7|location=New York|language=en}}</ref>

Ashbery published some work in the avant-garde [[little magazine]] [[Nomad (magazine)|''Nomad'']] at the beginning of the 1960s. He then wrote two collections while in France, the highly controversial ''The Tennis Court Oath'' (1962) and ''Rivers and Mountains'' (1966), before returning to New York to write ''The Double Dream of Spring'', published in 1970.<ref>{{Cite thesis|last=Jordan|first=Perrin Robert|date=December 2013|title="Rivers and mountains" : the conceptual wedding of the temporal and spatial in the early volumes of John Ashbery|url=https://repositories.lib.utexas.edu/handle/2152/24089|journal=University of Texas Electronic Theses and Dissertations|type=Thesis |language=en}}</ref>

Increasing critical recognition in the 1970s transformed Ashbery from an obscure avant-garde experimentalist into one of America's most important poets (though still one of its most controversial). After the publication of ''Three Poems'' (1973) came ''[[Self-portrait in a Convex Mirror (book)|Self-portrait in a Convex Mirror]]'', for which he was awarded the three major American poetry awards: the [[Pulitzer Prize]],<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.pulitzer.org/winners/john-ashbery|title=Winners in Poetry: Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror, by John Ashbery (Viking)|website=www.pulitzer.org|language=en|access-date=November 18, 2018}}</ref> the [[National Book Award for Poetry|National Book Award]],<ref name=nba1976>
[https://www.nationalbook.org/awards-prizes/national-book-awards-1976 "National Book Awards – 1976"]. [[National Book Foundation]]. Retrieved 2012-02-25. <br>(With acceptance speech by Ashbery and essay by [[Evie Shockley]] from the Awards 60-year anniversary blog.)</ref> and the [[National Book Critics Circle Award]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://bookcritics.org/blog/archive/in_retrospect_maureen_n._mclane_on_john_ashberys_self_portrait_in_a_convex_|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090915174418/http://bookcritics.org/blog/archive/in_retrospect_maureen_n._mclane_on_john_ashberys_self_portrait_in_a_convex_|url-status=dead|archive-date=September 15, 2009|title=National Book Critics Circle: In Retrospect: Maureen N. McLane on John Ashbery's "Self Portrait in a Convex Mirror" – Critical Mass Blog|website=bookcritics.org|language=en|access-date=November 18, 2018}}</ref> The collection's title poem is considered one of the masterpieces of late 20th century American poetic literature.
[[File:Ashbery-2010-09-12.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Ashbery in 2010]]
His subsequent collection, the more difficult ''Houseboat Days'' (1977), reinforced Ashbery's reputation, as did 1979's ''As We Know'', which contains the long, double-columned poem "Litany". In 1988, his "Bridge Poem" was installed, using metal letters, on the 375-foot-wide [[Irene Hixon Whitney Bridge]] in Minneapolis; the poet was selected by the bridge's architect, artist [[Siah Armajani]], and commissioned by the [[Walker Art Center]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://walkerart.org/magazine/john-ashbery-siah-armajani-bridge-poem|title=Not a Conduit but a Place: John Ashbery Reads his Poem for Siah Armajani's Bridge|first=Paul|last=Schmelzere|date=September 12, 2017|via=Walker Reader}}</ref> By the 1980s and 1990s, Ashbery had become a central figure in American and more broadly English-language poetry, as his number of imitators attested.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://radioopensource.org/john-ashbery-is-you/|title=Let Us Now Praise John Ashbery – Open Source with Christopher Lydon|website=radioopensource.org|language=en-US|access-date=November 18, 2018|date=September 8, 2017}}</ref>

Ashbery's works are characterized by a free-flowing, often disjunctive syntax; extensive linguistic play, often infused with considerable humor; and a prosaic, sometimes disarmingly flat or parodic tone. The play of the human mind is the subject of a great many of his poems. He once said that his goal was "to produce a poem that the critic cannot even talk about".<ref>{{cite journal|url=http://www.slate.com/id/2114565/|title=The Instruction Manual|first=Meghan|last=O'Rourke|date=March 9, 2005|access-date=September 3, 2017|journal=Slate}}</ref> Formally, the earliest poems show the influence of conventional poetic practice, yet by ''The Tennis Court Oath'' a much more revolutionary engagement with form appears.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Straub|first=Peter|date=2007|title=The Oath Unbroken: The Tennis Court Oath (1962)|journal=Conjunctions|issue=49|pages=259–262|jstor=24516471}}</ref> Ashbery returned to something approaching a reconciliation between tradition and innovation with many of the poems in ''The Double Dream of Spring'',<ref name="test">{{cite journal|jstor=490097|title=Ashbery and the Individual Talent|first=James|last=Longenbach|date=September 3, 1997|journal=American Literary History|volume=9|issue=1|pages=103–127|doi=10.1093/alh/9.1.103}}</ref> though his ''Three Poems'' are written in long blocks of prose. Although he never again approached the radical experimentation of ''The Tennis Court Oath'' poems or "[[The Skaters]]" and "Into the Dusk-Charged Air" from his collection ''Rivers and Mountains'', syntactic and semantic experimentation, linguistic expressiveness, deft, often abrupt shifts of register, and insistent wit remained consistent elements of his work.

Ashbery's art criticism has been collected in the 1989 volume ''Reported Sightings, Art Chronicles 1957–1987'', edited by the poet [[David Bergman (American writer)|David Bergman]].<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1989-09-24-bk-130-story.html|title=REPORTED SIGHTINGS: Art Chronicles, 1957–1987 by John Ashbery edited by David Bergman (Alfred A. Knopf: $35; 417 pp.)|last=Brunet|first=Elena|date=September 24, 1989|newspaper=Los Angeles Times|access-date=November 18, 2018|language=en-US|issn=0458-3035}}</ref> He wrote one novel, ''A Nest of Ninnies'', with fellow poet [[James Schuyler]],<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.dalkeyarchive.com/the-making-of-john-ashbery-and-james-schuylers-a-nest-of-ninnies/|title=The Making of John Ashbery and James Schuyler's A Nest of Ninnies {{!}} Dalkey Archive Press|website=www.dalkeyarchive.com|language=en-US|access-date=November 18, 2018}}</ref> and in his 20s and 30s penned several plays, three of which have been collected in ''Three Plays'' (1978).<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PMwfAQAAIAAJ|title=Three Plays|last=Ashbery|first=John|date=1988|publisher=Carcanet|isbn=978-0-85635-745-9|language=en}}</ref> Ashbery's [[Charles Eliot Norton Lectures]] at [[Harvard University]] were published as ''Other Traditions'' in 2000.<ref>{{Cite book|url=http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674006645|title=Other Traditions — John Ashbery {{!}} Harvard University Press|series=The Charles Eliot Norton Lectures |date=December 2001 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=9780674006645 |language=en|access-date=November 18, 2018}}</ref> A larger collection of his prose writings, ''Selected Prose'', appeared in 2005.<ref name="npr.org">[https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4542617 NPR interview with Ashbery about his collection ''Where Shall I Wander'' – including poem audio. March 19, 2005]</ref> In 2008, his ''Collected Poems 1956–1987'' was published as part of the [[Library of America]] series. This made Ashbery the first living poet to have his work published by the LOA.<ref>{{cite magazine|title=The second volume of John Ashbery's collected poems is a tribute|url=https://www.economist.com/news/books-and-arts/21735576-even-b-side-ashbery-poems-cannot-be-mistaken-anyone-elses-work-second-volume|access-date=January 26, 2018|magazine=[[The Economist]]}}</ref>

==Awards and honors==
{{Main|List of honors received by John Ashbery}}
* 1956: [[Yale Younger Poets Prize]], for ''[[Some Trees]]'' (1956) awarded by [[W.H. Auden]]
* 1962: [[Ingram Merrill Foundation]] Fellowship
* 1972: [[Ingram Merrill Foundation]] Fellowship
* 1976: [[National Book Award]] for ''[[Self-portrait in a Convex Mirror (book)|Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror]]'' (1975).
* 1976: [[National Book Critics Circle Award]] for ''[[Self-portrait in a Convex Mirror (book)|Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror]]'' (1975).
* 1976: [[Pulitzer Prize in Poetry]] for ''[[Self-portrait in a Convex Mirror (book)|Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror]]'' (1975).
* 1984: Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize for ''A Wave'' (1984)
* 1984: [[Bollingen Prize in Poetry]] for ''A Wave'' (1984)
* 1985: [[MacArthur Fellowship|MacArthur Fellows Program]] Fellowship
* 1987: Golden Plate Award of the [[Academy of Achievement|American Academy of Achievement]]<ref>{{cite web|title= Golden Plate Awardees of the American Academy of Achievement |website=www.achievement.org|publisher=[[American Academy of Achievement]]|url= https://achievement.org/our-history/golden-plate-awards/}}</ref>
* 1995: [[Robert Frost Medal]]
* 2002: Bestowed the rank of Officier de la [[Légion d'honneur]] by the Republic of France.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.americamagazine.org/arts-culture/2017/09/08/john-ashbery-existential-loneliness-brilliant-poet|title=John Ashbery: The existential loneliness of a brilliant poet|date=September 8, 2017|work=America Magazine|access-date=November 18, 2018|language=en}}</ref>
* 2005: finalist for [[National Book Award]] for ''Where Shall I Wander'' (2005)
* 2008: Robert Creeley Award<ref>{{cite web | url=http://robertcreeleyfoundation.org/?page_id=54 | title=Robert Creeley Award | access-date=March 19, 2015 | website=robertcreeleyfoundation.org}}</ref>
* 2008: [[America Award in Literature|America Award]] for a lifetime contribution to international writing
* 2011 [[National Humanities Medal]]
* 2011: Inducted into the [[New York Writers Hall of Fame]]
* 2011: [[National Book Foundation]] [[National Book Award#Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters|Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters]]<ref name=medal>[http://www.nationalbook.org/amerletters.html "Distinguished Contribution to American Letters"]. National Book Foundation. Retrieved March 11, 2012.<br>(With acceptance speech by Ashbery.)</ref>
* 2017: [[The Raymond Roussel Society Medal]]

==Bibliography==
{{Main|John Ashbery bibliography}}

===Poetry===

====Collections====
{{div col}}
* ''Turandot and other poems'' (1953)
* ''Some Trees'' (1956), winner of the 1955 [[Yale Series of Younger Poets]]
* ''[[The Tennis Court Oath (book)|The Tennis Court Oath]]'' (1962)
* ''Rivers and Mountains'' (1966)
* ''The Double Dream of Spring'' (1970)
* ''Three Poems'' (1972)
* ''The Vermont Notebook'' (1975), illustrated prose poems
* ''[[Self-portrait in a Convex Mirror (book)|Self-portrait in a Convex Mirror]]'' (1975), awarded the [[Pulitzer Prize]], the [[National Book Award]]<ref name=nba1976/> and the [[National Book Critics Circle Award]]
* ''Houseboat Days'' (1977)
* ''As We Know'' (1979)
* ''Shadow Train'' (1981)
* ''A Wave'' (1984), awarded the [[Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize]] and the [[Bollingen Prize]]
* ''April Galleons'' (1987)
* ''[[Flow Chart (poem)|Flow Chart]]'' (1991), book-length poem
* ''[[Hotel Lautréamont]]'' (1992)
* ''[[And the Stars Were Shining]]'' (1994)
* ''[[Can You Hear, Bird?]]'' (1995)
* ''The Mooring of Starting Out: The First Five Books of Poetry'' (1997)
* ''Wakefulness'' (1998)
* ''[[Girls on the Run (poem)|Girls on the Run]]'' (1999), a book-length poem inspired by the work of [[Henry Darger]]
* ''[[Your Name Here (Ashbery book)|Your Name Here]]'' (2000)
* ''[[As Umbrellas Follow Rain]]'' (2001)
* ''[[Chinese Whispers (Ashbery book)|Chinese Whispers]]'' (2002)
* ''[[Where Shall I Wander]]'' (2005) (finalist for the National Book Award)<ref name="npr.org"/>
* ''Notes from the Air: Selected Later Poems'' (2007) (winner of the 2008 International [[Griffin Poetry Prize]])
* ''[[A Worldly Country]]'' (2007)
* ''[[Planisphere (book)|Planisphere]]'' (2009)
* ''Collected Poems 1956–87'' (Carcanet Press) (2010), ed. Mark Ford
* ''[[Quick Question (book)|Quick Question]]'' (2012)
* ''Breezeway'' (2015)
* ''Commotion of the Birds'' (2016)
* ''They Knew What They Wanted: Collages and Poems'' (2018)
* ''Parallel Movement of the Hands: Five Unfinished Longer Works'' (2021)
{{div col end}}

==== Poems ====
{|class='wikitable sortable' width='90%'
|-
!|Title
!|Year
!|First published
!|Reprinted/collected in
|-
|East February
|2014
|{{cite magazine |last=Ashbery |first=John |date=March 24, 2014 |title=East February |magazine=[[The New Yorker]] |volume=90 |issue=5 |pages=78 |url=http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/03/24/east-february |access-date=February 26, 2015}}
|
|-
|[[At North Farm]]
|1984
|<ref>{{cite magazine|last=Ashbery|first=John|date=April 9, 1984|title=At North Farm|magazine=The New Yorker}}</ref>
|
|}

===Prose, plays and translations===
* ''A Nest of Ninnies'' (1969), with [[James Schuyler]]. (Carcanet Press 1987, Paladin Books 1990)
* ''Three Plays'' (1978). Carcanet Press (1988).
* {{cite book |last=Mayoux |first=Jean-Jacques |others=Trans. by John Ashbery |title=Melville |url=https://archive.org/details/melville00melv |url-access=registration |year=1960|publisher=New York, Grove Press }}
* ''The Ice Storm'' (1987), (32-page pamphlet)
* ''Reported Sightings: Art Chronicles, 1957–1987'' (1989) (Alfred A. Knopf), ed. David Bergman, Art Criticism and Commentary
* ''Other Traditions''(2001)[http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog/ASHOTH.html Subjects and Series | Harvard University Press]
* ''100 Multiple-Choice Questions'' (2000) (reprint of 1970 experimental pamphlet)
* ''Selected Prose 1953–2003'' (2005)
* Martory, Pierre ''The Landscapist'' Ashbery (Tr.) [http://www.carcanet.co.uk/cgi-bin/indexer?product=9781847770004 Carcanet Press (2008)]
* Rimbaud, Arthur ''Illuminations'' Ashbery (Tr.) [[W. W. Norton & Company]] (2011)
* ''Collected French Translations: Poetry'', edited by Rosanne Wasserman and Eugene Richie (2014)
* ''Collected French Translations: Prose'', edited by Rosanne Wasserman and Eugene Richie (2014)

==References==
{{Reflist|30em}}

==Further reading==
* Kacper Bartczak, ''In Search of Communication and Community: the Poetry of John Ashbery'' (Peter Lang, 2006)
* [[Harold Bloom]], ''Figures of Capable Imagination''
* [[Harold Bloom]], ed., ''Modern Critical Views: John Ashbery'' (Chelsea House Publishers, 1985)
* Andrew Dubois, ''Ashbery's Forms of Attention'' (University of Alabama Press, 2006)
* [[Andrew Epstein]], ''Beautiful Enemies: Friendship and Postwar American Poetry'' (Oxford University Press, 2006)
* David Herd, ''John Ashbery and American Poetry'' (Manchester University Press, 2000)
* Ben Hickman, ''John Ashbery and English Poetry'' ([https://web.archive.org/web/20121221004323/http://www.cup.columbia.edu/book/978-0-7486-4475-9/john-ashbery-and-english-poetry Edinburgh University Press], 2012)
* [[David Lehman]], ''The Last Avant-Garde: The Making of The New York School of Poets'' (Anchor Books, 1999)
* [[David Lehman]], ed., ''Beyond Amazement: New Essays on John Ashbery'' (Cornell University Press, 1980)
* David Perkins, ''A History of Modern Poetry, Volume II, Modernism and After'' ([http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674399471 Harvard University Press], 1987)
* Laura Quinney, ''The Poetics of Disappointment: Wordsworth to Ashbery''
* [[David Shapiro (poet)|David Shapiro]], ''John Ashbery: An Introduction to the Poetry'' (Columbia University Press, 1979)
* John Shoptaw, ''On the Outside Looking Out: John Ashbery's Poetry'' ([http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674636132 Harvard University Press], 1995)
* [[Stephen Shore]], [[Lynne Tillman]], ''The Velvet Years: Warhol's Factory 1965–1967''
* [[Susan M. Schultz]], ed., ''The Tribe of John: Ashbery and Contemporary Poetry'' (The University of Alabama Press, 1995)
* Mark Silverberg, ''The New York School Poets and the Neo-Avant-Garde'' (Ashgate, 2010)
* [[Helen Vendler]], ''Soul Says'' ([http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674821477 Harvard University Press], 1996)
* John Emil Vincent, ''John Ashbery and You: His Later Books'' (University of Georgia Press, 2007)
* [[Pierre Vinclair]], ''Autoportrait de John Ashbery. Une cérémonie improvisée'' [fr], Paris, Hermann, 2021.

==External links==
{{commons category}}
{{wikiquote}}
* [https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/john-ashberys-whisper-out-of-time John Ashbery’s Whisper Out of Time] [[Ben Lerner]] on John Ashbery in ''The New Yorker''
* [http://cordite.org.au/scholarly/a-serpentine-gesture/ ‘a serpentine | Gesture’: The Synthetic Reconstruction of Ashbery’s Poetic Voice] in ''Cordite Poetry Review''
* [http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poet.html?id=233 Poems by John Ashbery at PoetryFoundation.org]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20060614130045/http://www.flowchartfoundation.org/arc/ The Ashbery Resource Center]
* [http://epc.buffalo.edu/authors/ashbery/ John Ashbery at EPC]
* [http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/238 John Ashbery—the Academy of American Poets]
* {{cite journal| url=http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/3014/the-art-of-poetry-no-33-john-ashbery| title=John Ashbery, The Art of Poetry No. 33| journal=Paris Review| volume=Winter 1983| issue=90| date=Winter 1983| author=Peter A. Stitt }}
* Audio recordings from Key West Literary Seminar, 2003: [http://www.kwls.org/podcasts/john_ashbery_2003/ Ashbery reading from ''Chinese Whispers'']; [http://www.kwls.org/podcasts/john_ashbery_on_elizabeth_bish/ Ashbery's 'mini-lecture' on Elizabeth Bishop]
* [http://hcl.harvard.edu/poetryroom/listeningbooth/poets/ashbery.cfm Audio recordings of John Ashbery] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140729061033/http://hcl.harvard.edu/poetryroom/listeningbooth/poets/ashbery.cfm |date=July 29, 2014 }}, from the [[Woodberry Poetry Room]], [[Harvard University]]
* [http://www.carcanet.co.uk/cgi-bin/indexer?owner_id=16 Carcanet Press – John Ashbery's UK publisher]
* [http://www.griffinpoetryprize.com/awards-and-poets/shortlists/2008-shortlist/john-ashbery/ Griffin Poetry Prize biography]
* [http://www.griffinpoetryprize.com/see-and-hear-poetry/a-g/john-ashbery/ Griffin Poetry Prize reading, including video clip]
* [http://www.english.illinois.edu/MAPS/poets/a_f/ashbery/ashbery.htm Modern American Poetry] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140808173312/http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/a_f/ashbery/ashbery.htm |date=August 8, 2014 }}, critical essays on Ashbery's works
* Bookworm Interviews (Audio) with [[Michael Silverblatt]]: [http://www.kcrw.com/news-culture/shows/bookworm/john-ashbery/ May 2007], [http://www.kcrw.com/news-culture/shows/bookworm/john-ashbery-1/ May 2009], [http://www.kcrw.com/news-culture/shows/bookworm/john-ashbery-2/ April 2010]
* [https://bombmagazine.org/articles/john-ashbery/ John Ashbery by Adam Fitzgerald] in ''[[BOMB Magazine]]''

{{John Ashbery}}
{{PulitzerPrize PoetryAuthors 1976–2000}}
{{Poets in The New American Poetry 1945–1960}}
{{NY Poets Laureate|state=autocollapse}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ashbery, John}}
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