Ted Kooser

Theodore J. Kooser (born April 25, 1939) is an American poet. He won the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry in 2005. He served as Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004 to 2006. Kooser was one of the first poets laureate selected from the Great Plains, and is known for his conversational style of poetry.

Biography

Early life Ted Kooser was born in Ames, Iowa, on April 25, 1939. Growing up, Kooser attended Ames Public Schools for elementary and middle school. When Kooser arrived at Ames High School, his interest diverted from the library, and it went to cars. He joined the Nightcrawlers Car Club and became secretary of the group in 1956. His motivation for writing in high school can be in part credited to one of his teachers, Mary McNally, who encouraged him to continue writing essays and poems that reflected his life.

Education Kooser graduated from Ames High School with a class of 175 students and enrolled at Iowa State University, the alma mater of his uncles. He began writing short nonfiction stories for the Iowa State student literary magazine. He also joined the Iowa State Writer's Round Table, which he credits for fine-tuning his writing skills; Iowa Senator Tom Harkin was also a part of the group. In 1961, Kooser moved to Marshalltown, Iowa, to student teach English classes. The following year he graduated with a BS in English education from Iowa State University and moved to Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to live with his parents. After winning the Vreeland Award for poetry in 1964, he soon after lost his graduate readership from the University for his poor GPA. In 1967, he received his MA from Nebraska.

Career After earning his MA, Kooser worked at Bankers Life Nebraska. He eventually went on to work for Lincoln Benefit Life (a subsidiary of Allstate), an insurance company, for 35 years before retiring as vice president at the age of 60. He wrote for an hour and a half before work every morning, and by the time he retired, Kooser had published seven books of poetry.

On August 12, 2004, he was named Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry by the Librarian of Congress to serve a term from October 2004 through May 2005.

In April 2005, Theodore J. Kooser was appointed to serve a second term as Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry. During that same week, Kooser received the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his book Delights & Shadows (Copper Canyon Press, 2004). Edward Hirsch wrote: "There is a sense of quiet amazement at the core of all Kooser's work, but it especially seems to animate his new collection of poems, Delights & Shadows."

Kooser's most recent books are Kindest Regards: New and Selected Poems and Red Stilts (2020).

He founded and hosted the newspaper project "American Life in Poetry". In 2020, Kooser chose Kwame Dawes, a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, to be his successor as of January 1, 2021. Kooser also edits the Ted Kooser Contemporary Poetry series published by the University of Nebraska Press.

Midwest Poetry Renaissance Ted Kooser was part of the Midwest Poetry Renaissance in the 1960s and 1970s. The Midwest Poetry Renaissance drew on elements of Rural America through a five-state swath of the Great Plains region. Poets of the Midwest were respected among artists throughout the country due to being informed of larger societal forces, such as the distrust of a media-driven culture.

Poetic Style Ted Kooser is known for his conversational style of poetry that is accessible to a nonliterary public. Recurring themes include love, family, place, and time, but he does not consider himself a regional poet. Kooser has served on the Lincoln Library Board. He was founding president of The Nebraska Literary Heritage Association.

Kooser is married to Kathleen Rutledge, former editor of the Lincoln Journal Star. They have one son and two grandchildren.

Awards & Honors