Prose is a form of written language that usually exhibits a natural flow of speech and grammatical structure–an exception is the narrative device stream of consciousness. Textbooks, newspaper articles, and most novels (there are verse novels], are examples of works written in prose. Prose differs from most traditional poetry, the form of which has a regular structure, consisting verse based on metre and rhyme. However, developments in modern literature, including free verse concrete poetry, and prose poetry, have led to the idea of poetry and prose as two ends on a spectrum. rather than firmly distinct from each other; the American poet T. S. Eliot noted, whereas "the distinction between verse and prose is clear, the distinction between poetry and prose is obscure";
Coventry Kersey Dighton Patmore was an English poet and critic best known for The Angel in the House, his narrative poem about the Victorian ideal of a happy marriage.
Iosif Aleksandrovich Brodsky was a Russian-American poet and essayist.
Paul Muldoon is an Irish poet. He has published over thirty collections and won a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and the T. S. Eliot Prize. He held the post of Oxford Professor of Poetry from 1999 to 2004. At Princeton University he is both the Howard G. B. Clark '21 University Professor in the Humanities and Founding Chair of the Lewis Center for the Arts. He has also served as president of the Poetry Society (UK) and Poetry Editor at The New Yorker.
Spoken word refers to an oral poetic performance art that is based mainly on the poetic as well as the performer's aesthetic qualities. It is a continuation of the ancient oral artistic tradition that started in the late 20th century and focuses on the aesthetics of recitation and word play, such as the performer's live intonation and voice inflection. Spoken word is a "catchall" term that includes any kind of poetry recited aloud, including poetry readings, poetry slams, jazz poetry, and hip hop music, and can include comedy routines and prose monologues. As spoken word poetry is performed live, it is different from written poetry, because the way it sounds is one of the main components. Unlike written poetry, the poetic text takes its quality less from the visual aesthetics on a page, but depends more on phonaesthetics, or the aesthetics of sound.
Louise Elisabeth Glück is an American poet and essayist. She won the 2020 Nobel Prize in Literature, whose judges praised "her unmistakable poetic voice that with austere beauty makes individual existence universal". Her other awards include the Pulitzer Prize, National Humanities Medal, National Book Award, National Book Critics Circle Award, and Bollingen Prize. From 2003 to 2004, she was Poet Laureate of the United States.
Sherman Joseph Alexie Jr. is a Spokane-Coeur d'Alene-American novelist, short story writer, poet, and filmmaker. His writings draw on his experiences as an Indigenous American with ancestry from several tribes. He grew up on the Spokane Indian Reservation and now lives in Seattle, Washington.
David Lehman is an American poet, non-fiction writer, and literary critic, and the founder and series editor for The Best American Poetry. He was a writer and freelance journalist for fifteen years, writing for such publications as Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times. In 2006, Lehman served as Editor for the new Oxford Book of American Poetry. He taught and was the Poetry Coordinator at The New School in New York City until May 2018.
Jorie Graham is an American poet. The Poetry Foundation called Graham "one of the most celebrated poets of the American post-war generation." She replaced poet Seamus Heaney as Boylston Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard, becoming the first woman to be appointed to this position. She won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry (1996) for The Dream of the Unified Field: Selected Poems 1974-1994 and was chancellor of the Academy of American Poets from 1997 to 2003.
The Forward Prizes for Poetry are major British awards for poetry, presented annually at a public ceremony in London. They were founded in 1992 by William Sieghart with the aim of celebrating excellence in poetry and increasing its audience. The prizes do this by identifying and honouring talent: collections published in the UK and Ireland over the course of the previous year are eligible, as are single poems nominated by journal editors or prize organisers. Each year, works shortlisted for the prizes — plus those highly commended by the judges — are collected in the Forward Book of Poetry.
Mark Doty is an American poet and memoirist best known for his work My Alexandria. He was the winner of the National Book Award for Poetry in 2008.
Peter Balakian is an Armenian American poet, writer and academic, the Donald M. and Constance H. Rebar Professor of Humanities at Colgate University. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 2016.
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.
Kay Ryan is an American poet and educator. She has published seven volumes of poetry and an anthology of selected and new poems. From 2008 to 2010 she was the sixteenth United States Poet Laureate. In 2011 she was named a MacArthur Fellow and she won the Pulitzer Prize.
The Best American Poetry series consists of annual poetry anthologies, each containing seventy-five poems.
Yolande Cornelia "Nikki" Giovanni Jr. is an American poet, writer, commentator, activist, and educator. One of the world's most well-known African-American poets, her work includes poetry anthologies, poetry recordings, and nonfiction essays, and covers topics ranging from race and social issues to children's literature. She has won numerous awards, including the Langston Hughes Medal and the NAACP Image Award. She has been nominated for a Grammy Award for her poetry album, The Nikki Giovanni Poetry Collection. Additionally, she has been named as one of Oprah Winfrey's 25 "Living Legends".
William Hobart Dickey was an American poet and professor of English and creative writing at San Francisco State University. He authored 15 books of poetry over a career that lasted three and a half decades.
West Branch is an American literary magazine based at Bucknell University and published by the Stadler Center for Poetry. It was established in 1977 and publishes poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, and literary criticism. The editor-in-chief is G.C. Waldrep, also an editor of the Kenyon Review. In addition to the print magazine, West Branch also publishes West Branch Wired, an online supplement featuring fiction, poetry, and interviews.