biography
| name: |
Warren, Robert Penn
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1905–89)
|
| biography:
| Poet and writer, born in Guthrie, Kentucky, USA. He studied at Vanderbilt University (1925 BA), the University of California, Berkeley (1927 MA), Yale (1927–8), and Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar (1930 B Litt). At college he had joined with other poets known as the ‘Fugitives’ or ‘Southern agrarians’ to promote Southern conservative values, even defending segregation in I'll Take My Stand (1930), but from the 1950s on he was outspoken in demanding that the South change its ways. He taught at many institutions, primarily Yale (1961–73), and was named the first official Poet Laureate of the United States (1986), among many other honours. Based in Fairfield, CT, he worked as an editor, wrote critical essays, poetry, and novels, the most famous of which is All the King's Men (1946), based on the career of Huey Long. He was also a founder and editor of the Southern Review (1935–42) and an advisory editor of Kenyon Review (1938–68). |
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