A retired professor at the Johns Hopkins University has won Yale University’s Bollingen Prize in American Poetry. Allen Grossman, whom judges described as a “profoundly original American poet whose work embraces the co-existence of comedy and tragedy,” will receive the $100,000 award.
Past winners of the biennial award, established in 1949 by the philanthropist Paul Mellon, include Wallace Stevens, E.E. Cummings, and Marianne Moore. Educated at Harvard and Brandeis Universities, Mr. Grossman stayed at the latter as a professor until 1991, when he moved to Johns Hopkins. He retired from teaching in 2005.
The most recent winner of the prize, in 2007, was Frank Bidart. In 2005 Jay Wright was the recipient. —Steven Bushong
