Richard Howard | Author

About the Author

Richard Howard was born in Cleveland, Ohio on October 13, 1929. He received a B.A. from Columbia University in 1951 and studied at the Sorbonne as a Fellow of the French Government in 1952-1953. He briefly worked as a lexicographer, but soon turned his attention to poetry and poetic criticism. His show more works include Trappings: New Poems; Like Most Revelations: New Poems; Selected Poems; No Traveler; Findings; Alone with America; and Quantities. He won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1969 for Untitled Subjects. He is also a translator and published more than 150 translations from the French. He received the PEN Translation Prize in 1976 for his translation of E. M. Cioran's A Short History of Decay and the American Book Award for his 1983 translation of Charles Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal. In 1982, he was named a Chevalier of L'Ordre National du Mérite by the government of France. He teaches in the Writing Division of the School of the Arts, Columbia University. (Bowker Author Biography) show less

Image credit: Eileen Barroso / Columbia University

Works by Richard Howard

Popular Recent

The Best American Poetry 1995 (1995) — Editor — 162 copies

Deadly Sins (1994) — Contributor — 83 copies

Inner Voices: Selected Poems, 1963-2003 (1605) 56 copies

Paper Trail: Selected Prose, 1965-2003 (2004) 50 copies

Alone With America: Essays on the Art of Poetry in the United States Since 1950. (1969) 38 copies

No Traveler (1989) 26 copies

Trappings: New Poems (2000) 24 copies

Like Most Revelations (1994) 24 copies

Without Saying (2008) 24 copies

Untitled Subjects: Poems (1969) 23 copies

Inventory; essays (1968) — Editor — 20 copies

Lining Up (1984) 19 copies

Talking Cures: New Poems (2002) 18 copies

Fellow feelings: Poems (1976) 17 copies

Findings: A Book of Poems (1971) 16 copies

Two-Part Inventions: Poems (1974) 14 copies

Misgivings: Poems (1979) 13 copies

CY TWOMBLY: LEPANTO - A PAINTING IN TWELVE PARTS (VENICE) (2001) 12 copies

Preferences (1974) 9 copies

Selected Poems (Penguin International Poets) (1991) 9 copies

Quantities/Damages: Early Poems (1984) 8 copies

A Progressive Education (2014) 7 copies

The Silent Treatment (2005) 7 copies

Quantities (1962) 7 copies

Richard Howard Loves Henry James and Other American Writers (2020) 6 copies

The Damages (1967) 6 copies

If I Dream I Have You, I Have You (1997) 5 copies

Lee Krasner: The Umber Paintings 1959–1962 (2018) 5 copies

Photographs of Sharon Tate by Walter Chappell (2002) 4 copies

The New Gods 3 copies

A Different Tune (1998) 2 copies

Three Poems (2000) 2 copies

Decades (for Hart Crane) (1974) 2 copies

Breton: Nadja 1 copy

'A ghost at the banquet of literature' in AFR, 1 Dec 2000 [review of Graham Robb's 'Rimbaud'] 1 copy

Poems of Mr Richard Howard Composed of Several Times & Printed in True Copies from the Series Family Values 1 copy

Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes 1 copy

All Gall is Divided: The Aphorisms of a Legendary Iconoclast 1 copy

The erasers 1 copy

The Trouble with Being Born 1 copy

Corydon: A Novel 1 copy

A Natural Death 1 copy

Family Values, Poems of Mr. Richard Howard (1998) 1 copy

La Maison De Rendez-Vous 1 copy

Work Explorer

Associated Works

The Little Prince (1943) — Translator, some editions — 44,753 copies

Swann's Way (1913) — Introduction, some editions — 11,159 copies

The Flowers of Evil (1936) — Translator, some editions — 7,582 copies

The Charterhouse of Parma (1839) — Translator & Afterword, some editions — 4,411 copies

The Immoralist (1902) — Translator, some editions — 3,340 copies

Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason (1961) — Translator, some editions — 3,288 copies

Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography (1980) — Translator, some editions — 2,549 copies

Lost Illusions (-0001) — Introduction, some editions — 2,489 copies

A Lover's Discourse: Fragments (1977) — Translator, some editions — 2,054 copies

A Happy Death (1972) — Translator, some editions — 1,800 copies

The Making of a Poem: A Norton Anthology of Poetic Forms (2000) — Contributor — 1,267 copies

S/Z: An Essay (1970) — Preface, some editions — 1,233 copies

Paris in the Twentieth Century (1860) — Translator, some editions — 905 copies

A Short History of Decay (1949) — Translator, some editions — 857 copies

The Vintage Book of Contemporary American Poetry (1990) — Contributor — 756 copies

Beauty and the Beast (1757) — Translator, some editions — 744 copies

Empire of Signs (1970) — Translator, some editions — 741 copies

Jealousy (1957) — Translator, some editions — 625 copies

The Erasers (1953) — Translator, some editions — 607 copies

The Temptation to Exist (1956) — Translator, some editions — 581 copies

Jealousy / In the Labyrinth (1957) — Translator, some editions — 577 copies

William Marshal: The Flower of Chivalry (1984) — Translator, some editions — 532 copies

The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre (1970) — Translator, some editions — 446 copies

The Unknown Masterpiece / Gambara (1831) — Translator, some editions — 403 copies

Strong as Death (1889) — Translator, some editions — 398 copies

Collected Travel Writings: The Continent (1993) — Editor — 310 copies

Anathemas and Admirations (1987) — Translator, some editions — 309 copies

The mourning diary (2009) — Translator, some editions — 303 copies

For a New Novel: Essays on Fiction (1963) — Translator, some editions — 303 copies

Balcony in the Forest (1958) — Translator, some editions — 301 copies

Alien Hearts (1890) — Translator, some editions; Preface, some editions — 256 copies

Collected Travel Writings: Great Britain and America (1993) — Editor — 253 copies

Main Currents in Sociological Thought, Volume 1 (1965) — Translator, some editions — 235 copies

The Best American Poetry 2001 (2001) — Contributor — 223 copies

The New Gods (1901) — Translator, some editions — 215 copies

The House of Assignation (1965) — Translator, some editions; Translator, some editions — 204 copies

When the World Spoke French (2001) — Translator, some editions — 203 copies

Last Year at Marienbad (1969) — Translator, some editions — 200 copies

The Fall Into Time (1964) — Translator, some editions — 186 copies

Main Currents in Sociological Thought, Volume 2 (1967) — Translator, some editions — 183 copies

Gay and Lesbian Poetry in Our Time (Stonewall Inn Editions) (1836) — Contributor — 180 copies

The Best American Poetry 2003 (2003) — Contributor — 174 copies

The Best American Poetry 1994 (1994) — Contributor — 172 copies

Repetition (2001) — Translator, some editions — 168 copies

The Best American Poetry 1998 (1998) — Contributor — 161 copies

Poetry Speaks Expanded: Hear Poets Read Their Own Work from Tennyson to Plath (2007) — Contributor — 152 copies

The Best American Poetry 2008 (2008) — Contributor — 135 copies

The Best American Poetry 2009 (2009) — Contributor — 134 copies

Letters of Wallace Stevens (1966) — Foreword, some editions — 119 copies

Selected Poems 1923-1967 (1970) — Translator — 116 copies

The Trolley (2001) — Translator, some editions — 114 copies

Voyage Around My Room: Selected Works of Xavier de Maistre (1795) — Introduction — 109 copies

The Best American Poetry 2016 (2016) — Contributor — 103 copies

Annam (1993) — Translator, some editions — 89 copies

The Best American Poetry 2012 (2012) — Contributor — 84 copies

Degrees (1960) — Translator, some editions — 75 copies

Reflections on the Guillotine (1959) — Translator, some editions — 74 copies

Brassai: The Eye of Paris (1989) — Author — 63 copies

Proust in the power of photography (1997) — Translator, some editions — 62 copies

The Bestiary (2016) — Contributor — 58 copies

The Collected Poems: A Dual-Language Edition with Parallel Text (2013) — Translator, some editions — 57 copies

The Table Talk of W.H. Auden (1990) — Introduction — 54 copies

The traitor (1957) — Translator, some editions — 54 copies

Hourmaster (1997) — Translator, some editions — 52 copies

Orpheus and Company: Contemporary Poems on Greek Mythology (1999) — Contributor — 48 copies

The New Young American Poets: An Anthology (2000) — Foreword, some editions; Introduction, some editions — 37 copies

Antaeus No. 75/76, Autumn 1994 - The Final Issue (1994) — Contributor — 32 copies

60 Years of American Poetry (1996) — Contributor — 28 copies

Cupid's Executioners (1966) — Translator — 16 copies

The Best of Electric Velocipede (2014) — Contributor — 14 copies

New American Review #4 (1968) — Contributor — 14 copies

American Review 22: The Magazine of New Writing (1975) — Contributor — 11 copies

Welcome Eumenides; poems (1972) — Foreword, some editions — 7 copies

The New Salmagundi Reader (1996) — Contributor — 3 copies

Antaeus No. 15, Autumn 1974 - Special Translation Issue (1974) — Translator — 2 copies

Critical Essays on Galway Kinnell (1996) — Contributor — 2 copies

Vector 286 (2017) — Contributor — 1 copy

THE BORZOI READER. VOLUME 1. NUMBER 1. (1989) — Contributor — 1 copy

Prose: A Literary Magazine, Volume 1 (1970) — Contributor — 1 copy

Tagged

1001 books (226) 19th century (625) 20th century (758) anthology (305) children (663) children's (1,079) children's books (291) children's literature (683) classic (1,184) classics (1,266) ebook (201) essays (264) fairy tales (243) fantasy (1,347) favorites (231) fiction (5,988) France (1,308) French (3,014) French fiction (327) French literature (2,788) history (447) illustrated (225) literary criticism (265) literature (1,788) love (274) Marcel Proust (236) non-fiction (633) novel (1,231) own (307) philosophy (1,799) photography (459) poetry (2,754) read (686) Roman (368) science fiction (203) sociology (210) theory (325) to-read (3,174) translation (484) unread (308)

Common Knowledge

Legal name: Orwitz, Richard Howard (adopted as, birth name unknown)
Howard, Richard Joseph (mother legally changed to)
Other names: ORWITZ, Richard HOWARD
HOWARD, Richard Joseph
HOWARD, Richard
Birthdate: 1929-10-13
Date of death: 2022-03-31
Gender: male
Nationality: USA
Birthplace: Cleveland, Ohio, USA
Places of residence: New York, New York, USA
Paris, France
Education: Columbia University
Sorbonne
Occupations: poet
translator
critic
professor
lexicographer
Organizations: American Academy of Arts and Letters (Literature, 1983)
Awards and honors: Frost Medal (2004)
Fellowship of the Academy of American Poets (1989)
American Academy of Arts and Letters Academy Award (1970)
PEN/Ralph Manheim Medal for Translation (1985)

Members

Reviews

Inventory: Essays By Michel Butor by Michel Butor

I found most of the pieces in this collection to be too 'inside baseball' for my taste. But still worth the read and I very much enjoyed 'The Golden Age of Jules Verne' and 'On Fairy Tales'.

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heggiep | Jul 25, 2022 |

The Best American Poetry 1995 by David Lehman

Like most collections of poems by various writers, for me, it's hit or miss, but the hits are very good. Unfortunately, as a lyrical time capsule of 1995 poetry, it makes me think that that year in poems was a very self-centered and pretentious one. But I liked that the editors purposefully set out to curate a volume of poems that was light on the old favorites and fresh with new talent. Even with all of the poems I didn't take a shine to, it's definitely a volume of top American poetry worth examining as both a writer and a reader.… (more)

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sarahlh | Mar 6, 2021 |

Alone With America: Essays on the Art of Poetry in… by Richard Howard

Howard is an even-handed critic and one able to appreciate poetry that may not immediately suit his temperament. It's readable, even-handed survey of U.S. poetry post-1950.

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ostrom | Nov 27, 2007 |

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