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{{Short description|American poet}}
{{Short description|American poet (1895–1961)}}
{{Infobox writer
{{Refimprove|date=December 2012}}
[[File:Robert Hillyer.jpg|thumb|right|Robert Hillyer]]
| name = Robert Hillyer
| image = Robert Hillyer.jpg
| birth_name = Robert Silliman Hillyer
| birth_date = {{Birth date|1895|06|03}}
| birth_place = [[East Orange, New Jersey]], US
| death_date = {{Death date and age|1961|12|24|1895|06|03}}
| death_place = [[Wilmington, Delaware]], US
| occupation = poet, writer, university faculty
| education = [[Harvard University]] ([[Bachelor of Arts|BA]])
| movement = [[Harvard Aesthetes]]
| notable_works = ''The Collected Verse of Robert Hillyer''<br />''A Letter to Robert Frost and Others''
| awards = [[Pulitzer Prize in Poetry]], 1934
}}
'''Robert Silliman Hillyer''' (June 3, 1895 – December 24, 1961) was an American [[poet]] and professor of English literature.<ref name="Vindicator obit">{{cite news |date=December 31, 1961 |title=Robert Hillyer, Pulitzer Poet |newspaper=The Youngstown Vindicator |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=BC1AAAAAIBAJ&sjid=91gMAAAAIBAJ&dq=robert%20hillyer%20dies&pg=1171%2C3819990 |accessdate=December 26, 2012}}</ref> He won a [[Pulitzer Prize for Poetry|Pulitzer Prize]] for poetry in 1934.<ref name="Vindicator obit" />
'''Robert Silliman Hillyer''' (June 3, 1895 – December 24, 1961) was an American [[poet]] and professor of English literature.<ref name="Vindicator obit">{{cite news |date=December 31, 1961 |title=Robert Hillyer, Pulitzer Poet |newspaper=The Youngstown Vindicator |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=BC1AAAAAIBAJ&sjid=91gMAAAAIBAJ&dq=robert%20hillyer%20dies&pg=1171%2C3819990 |accessdate=December 26, 2012}}</ref> He won a [[Pulitzer Prize for Poetry|Pulitzer Prize]] for poetry in 1934.<ref name="Vindicator obit" />


== Early life ==
== Early life ==
Hillyer was born in [[East Orange, New Jersey]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |last= |first= |date=2022-05-16 |title=Robert Hillyer |url=https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/robert-hillyer |access-date=2022-05-17 |website=Poetry Foundation |language=en}}</ref> He attended [[Kent School]] in [[Kent, Connecticut]]. He also attended [[Harvard University]], graduating [[cum laude]] in 1917.<ref name="Vindicator obit" /> While there, he was the editor of the literary magazine ''[[The Harvard Advocate]], and was'' affiliated with the group known as the [[Harvard Aesthetes]].<ref name=":0" />
Hillyer was born in [[East Orange, New Jersey]] to an old Connecticut family.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |last= |first= |date=2022-05-16 |title=Robert Hillyer |url=https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/robert-hillyer |access-date=2022-05-17 |website=Poetry Foundation |language=en}}</ref><ref name=":1">{{Cite web |date=2006-06-28 |title=Robert Hillyer |url=http://www.harvardsquarelibrary.org/poets/hillyer.php |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060628130752/http://www.harvardsquarelibrary.org/poets/hillyer.php |archive-date=June 28, 2006 |access-date=2022-05-17 |website=Poets of Cambridge, U.S.A. |publisher=Harvard Square Library}}</ref> He attended [[Kent School]] in [[Kent, Connecticut]]. After high school, he attended [[Harvard University]], graduating [[cum laude]] in 1917.<ref name="Vindicator obit" /> While there, he was the editor of the literary magazine ''[[The Harvard Advocate]], and was'' affiliated with the group known as the [[Harvard Aesthetes]].<ref name=":0" />


When [[World War I]] began, he went to [[France]] and volunteered for the [[American Volunteer Motor Ambulance Corps|Norton-Harjes Ambulance Corps]], along with Harvard classmate [[John Dos Passos]].<ref name="Vindicator obit" /><ref name=":0" /> Once the United States entered the war, he joined the American forces.<ref name="Vindicator obit" />
When [[World War I]] began, he went to [[France]] and volunteered for the [[American Volunteer Motor Ambulance Corps|Norton-Harjes Ambulance Corps]], along with Harvard classmate [[John Dos Passos]].<ref name="Vindicator obit" /><ref name=":0" /> Once the United States entered the war, he joined the American forces.<ref name="Vindicator obit" /> After serving as an ambulance driver, Hillyer later returned to France to work in the US Ordnance Department.<ref name="hillyer-biography">{{cite web |last1=Nagle |first1=Robert |title=Biographical Sketch of Robert Hillyer |url=https://www.personvillepress.com/11378h/random/hillyer/weboutput/OEBPS/hillyer-biography.xhtml |website=My Heart For Hostage (Special Critical Edition) |publisher=Personville Press |access-date=3 November 2022}}</ref> After the Armistice, Hillyer worked as a military courier for the 1919 peace conference in Paris. For a while Hillyer and [[John Dos Passos]] shared a flat in Paris and even collaborated on an unpublished novel which they called "Great Novel" (or "G.N.", or "Seven Times round the Walls of Jericho"). Eventually the novel was abandoned in 1921 even though Dos Passos said that Hillyer's contributions had "genuineness" and "more ''tone'' than mine."


== Career ==
== Career ==


=== Academic ===
=== Academic ===
After World War I, Hillyer became professor of English at [[Harvard University]].<ref name="Vindicator obit" /><ref name=":0" />
Hillyer became a professor of English at [[Harvard University]] in 1919.<ref name="Vindicator obit" /><ref name=":0" /><ref name=":1" /> In the late 1920s, he taught at [[Trinity College (Connecticut)|Trinity College]] and was made a member of the Epsilon chapter of the literary fraternity [[St. Anthony Hall]] in 1927.


⚫
From 1937 to 1944, he was named to the [[Boylston Professorship of Rhetoric and Oratory]] at Harvard.<ref name=":0" /> From 1948 to 1951 Hillyer was a visiting [[professor]] at [[Kenyon College]].<ref name="Vindicator obit" /> He also taught at the [[University of Delaware]] from 1952 until his death.<ref name="Vindicator obit" /> While at Delaware Hillyer did various regular poetry readings between 1953-1960 which were recorded and are now available for listening through the university's archives.<ref> [https://library.udel.edu/special/findaids/view?docId=ead/mss0696.xml;tab=content#seriesi MSS 0696 - University of Delaware audio recordings of poetry readings ], accessed Feb 26 2021 </ref>
While teaching at [[Trinity College (Connecticut)|Trinity College]] in Hartford, Connecticut in the late 1920s, Hillyer was made a member of the Epsilon chapter of the literary fraternity [[St. Anthony Hall]] in 1927.


Over his academic life, Hillyer taught a number of writers (and poets) who later became well-known such as [[Theodore Roethke]],<ref name="roethke">{{cite web |title=Entry for Theodore Roethke |url=https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/literature-and-arts/american-literature-biographies/theodore-roethke |website=Encyclopedia.com |publisher=Cengage |access-date=30 July 2022}}</ref> [[James Gould Cozzens]], <ref>{{cite book |last1=McDonald |first1=Roxanne |title="Robert Hillyer" (Entry) |date=2021 |publisher=Salem Press Biographical Encyclopedia}}</ref> [[Howard Nemerov]], [[James Agee]], [[Norman Mailer]], [[Robert Fitzgerald]] and [[John Simon (critic)|John Simon]].<ref name="blazek">{{cite book |last1=Blazek |first1=William |title=Norton-Harjes Ambulance Corps and American Literature of World War 1 (Dissertation) |date=1986 |location=University of Aberdeen |page=292}}</ref>
⚫
From 1937 to 1944, he was named to the [[Boylston Professorship of Rhetoric and Oratory]] at Harvard.<ref name=":0" />


⚫
=== Poet ===
⚫
From 1948 to 1951 Hillyer was a visiting [[professor]] at [[Kenyon College]].<ref name="Vindicator obit" /> He also taught at the [[University of Delaware]] from 1952 until his death.<ref name="Vindicator obit" /> While at Delaware Hillyer did various regular poetry readings between 1953-1960. Several hours of audio were recorded from them and are available for listening from the U. of Delaware archives (MSS 0696).<ref> [https://library.udel.edu/special/findaids/view?docId=ead/mss0696.xml;tab=content#seriesi MSS 0696 - University of Delaware audio recordings of poetry readings ], accessed Feb 26 2021 </ref>
⚫
In 1919, Hillyer described himself as “a conservative and religious poet in a radical and blasphemous age."<ref name=":1" /> In 1934, he received a [[Pulitzer Prize for Poetry]] for his book ''The Collected Verse of Robert Hillyer''.<ref name="Vindicator obit" /><ref name=":0" /> His work is in meter and often rhyme and he tended to write about death, love and nature.<ref name="Vindicator obit" /> He is known for his sonnets and for poems such as "Theme and Variations" (on his war experiences) and the light "Letter to Robert Frost."


He became president of the [[Conservative Poetry Society of America.]]<ref name=":1" /> In this capacity, he attacked [[modernist poets]] such as [[T. S. Eliot]] and [[Ezra Pound]].<ref name=":1" />
While teaching at [[Trinity College (Connecticut)|Trinity College]] in Hartford, Connecticut in the late 1920s, Hillyer was made a member of the Epsilon chapter of the literary fraternity [[St. Anthony Hall]] in 1927.


=== Poetry ===
==Awards and honors==
⚫
* [[Pulitzer Prize for Poetry]] for "Collected Verse" in 1934.<ref name=":1" />
⚫
In 1939, Hillyer, received a [[Pulitzer Prize for Poetry]] for his book ''The Collected Verse of Robert Hillyer''.<ref name="Vindicator obit" /><ref name=":0" /> His work is in meter and often rhyme. He tended to write about death, love and nature.<ref name="Vindicator obit" /> He is known for his sonnets and for such poems as "Theme and Variations" (on his war experiences) and the light "Letter to Robert Frost."
⚫
* He was named to the [[Boylston Professorship of Rhetoric and Oratory]] at Harvard University in 1937.<ref name=":0" />

* His papers are housed at [[Syracuse University]].<ref name=":1" />
American composer [[Ned Rorem]]'s most famous art song is a setting of Hillyer's "Early in the Morning".

Hillyer is remembered as a kind of villain by [[Ezra Pound]] scholars. They associated him with his 1949 criticism of ''[[The Pisan Cantos]]'' in the ''[[Saturday Review (US magazine)|Saturday Review of Literature]]'', which sparked the [[Bollingen Foundation|Bollingen]] controversy.

==Awards==
⚫
* [[Pulitzer Prize for Poetry]] for "Collected Verse" in 1934.


==Works==
==Works==


===Poetry===
===Poetry===
* ''Pre-Pulitzer Poetry'' (Ebook, Personville Press, 2023). Includes the full text of 6 poetry books published by Hillyer before winning the Pulitzer Prize.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Nagle |first1=Robert |title=Book Announcement: Pre-Pulitzer Poetry |url=https://www.imaginaryplanet.net/weblogs/idiotprogrammer/2024/01/pre-pulitzer-poetry-by-robert-hillyer-ebook/ |website=Idiotprogrammer: Texas Literary Blog |date=3 January 2024 |publisher=Personville Press |access-date=12 April 2024}}</ref>
* ''The Collected Poems'' (Alfred Knopf, 1961)<ref name="Vindicator obit" />
* ''The Collected Poems'' (Alfred Knopf, 1961)<ref name="Vindicator obit" />
* {{cite book |title=The relic & other poems |url=https://archive.org/details/relicotherpoems00hill |url-access=registration |publisher=Knopf |year=1957}}
* ''[[iarchive:relicotherpoems00hill|The Relic & Other Poems]]'' (Knopf, 1957).<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hillyer |first=Robert |url=http://archive.org/details/relicotherpoems00hill |title=The relic & other poems |date=1957 |publisher=New York, Knopf |others=Internet Archive}}</ref>
* ''The Suburb by the Sea: New Poems'' (Knopf, 1952)<ref name=":0" />
* ''The Suburb by the Sea: New Poems'' (Knopf, 1952)<ref name=":0" />
* The Death of Captain Nemo: A Narrative Poem (A.A. Knopf, 1949)<ref name="Vindicator obit" /><ref name=":0" />
* ''The Death of Captain Nemo: A Narrative Poem'' (A.A. Knopf, 1949)<ref name="Vindicator obit" /><ref name=":0" />
* Poems for Music, 1917–1947. (1947)<ref name="Vindicator obit" />
* ''Poems for Music, 1917–1947''. (1947)<ref name="Vindicator obit" />
* ''My Heart for Hostage'' (1942)<ref name=":0" />
* ''Pattern of a Day'' (1940)<ref name=":0" />
* ''Pattern of a Day'' (1940)<ref name=":0" />
* ''In a Time of Mistrust'' (1939)<ref name=":0" />
* ''In a Time of Mistrust'' (1939)<ref name=":0" />
* ''A Letter to Robert Frost and Others (1937)''.<ref name=":0" />
* ''A Letter to Robert Frost and Others (1937)''.<ref name=":0" />
* ''The Collected Verse of Robert Hillyer''. (A. A. Knoft, 1933)<ref name=":0" />
* ''[[iarchive:collectedverseof0000hill|The Collected Verse of Robert Hillyer]]''. (A. A. Knoft, 1933)<ref name=":0" />
* ''[[iarchive:gatesofcompasspo0000hill|The Gates of the Compass: A Poem in Four Parts Together with Twenty-Two Shorter Pieces]]'' (Viking Press, 1930)<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hillyer |first=Robert |url=http://archive.org/details/gatesofcompasspo0000hill |title=The gates of the compass : a poem in four parts together with twenty-two shorter pieces |date=1930 |publisher=New York : Viking Press |others=Internet Archive}}</ref>
* {{cite book| title=The Coming Forth by Day: An Anthology of Poems from the [[Egyptian Book of the Dead]]| publisher=B.J. Brimmer Company| year=1923 }}
* {{cite book| title=The Seventh Hill| url=https://archive.org/details/seventhhill0000hill| url-access=registration| publisher=Viking Press| location=New York |year=1928 }}
* ''[[iarchive:seventhhill0000hill|The Seventh Hill]]'' (Viking Press, 1928)<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hillyer |first=Robert |url=http://archive.org/details/seventhhill0000hill |title=The seventh hill |date=1928 |publisher=New York : Viking Press |others=Internet Archive}}</ref>
* ''The Halt in the Garden'' (1925)<ref name=":0" />
* ''The Halt in the Garden'' (Elkin Matthews,1925)<ref name=":0" />
* ''The Coming Forth by Day: An Anthology of Poems from the Egyptian Book of the Dead'' (B.J. Brimmer Company, 1923)<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Coming Forth By Day – Black's Fine Books & Manuscripts |url=https://blacksbooks.ca/product/the-coming-forth-by-day/ |access-date=2022-05-17 |language=en-CA}}</ref>
⚫
* ''Alchemy: A Symphonic Poem'' (Kessinger Publishing, 1920)<ref name=":0" />
* ''[https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Robert_Hillyer_The_Hills_Give_Promise?id=gXA6AQAAIAAJ Hills Give Promise, a Volume of Lyrics, Together with Carmus: A Symphonic Poem]'' (B.J. Brimmer Company, 1923)<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hillyer |first=Robert |url=https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Robert_Hillyer_The_Hills_Give_Promise?id=gXA6AQAAIAAJ |title=The Hills Give Promise: A Volume of Lyrics, Together with Carmus: a Symphonic Poem |date=1923 |publisher=B. J. Brimmer Company |language=en |via=Google Play}}</ref>
⚫
* ''[[iarchive:bub_gb_ZAoPAAAAIAAJ|Alchemy: A Symphonic Poem]]'' (Brentano's, 1920)<ref name=":0" />
* ''[[iarchive:bub_gb__xKSgypX96UC|The Five Books of Youth]]'' (Brentano's, 1920)<ref name=":0" />
* ''[[iarchive:bub_gb__xKSgypX96UC|The Five Books of Youth]]'' (Brentano's, 1920)<ref name=":0" />
* Sonnets and Other Lyrics (Harvard University Press, 1917)<ref name=":0" />
* [[iarchive:sonnetsandother00hillgoog|Sonnets and Other Lyrics]] (Harvard University Press, 1917)<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":1" />
* ''Eight Harvard Poets'' (1917), which included work by [[E. E. Cummings]] and John Dos Passos<ref name=":0" />
* ''[[iarchive:eight_harvard_poets_1401_librivox|Eight Harvard Poets]]'' (1917), which included works by [[E. E. Cummings]] and [[John Dos Passos]]<ref name=":0" />
*
*
*
* {{cite book |last1=Hillyer |first1=Robert |title=Halt in the Garden |date=1925 |publisher=Elkin Matthews |location=London, UK |pages=48 |edition=1st}}
* {{cite book| url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_ZAoPAAAAIAAJ| quote=robert hillyer.| title=Alchemy: A Symphonic Poem | others=Illustrator Beatrice Stevens| publisher=Kessinger Publishing, LLC| year=1920 | first=Robert | last=Hillyer}}
* {{cite book |last1=Hillyer |first1=Robert |title=Hills give promise,a volume of lyrics, together with Carmus: a symphonic poem |date=1923 |publisher=B. J. Brimmer company |location=Boston, MA |page=160 |edition=1st |url=https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Robert_Hillyer_The_Hills_Give_Promise?id=gXA6AQAAIAAJ |accessdate=14 December 2019}}
*
* {{cite book| url=https://archive.org/details/sonnetsandother00hillgoog| quote=robert hillyer.| title=Sonnets and Other Lyrics| publisher=Harvard University Press| year=1917 | first=Robert | last=Hillyer}}
*{{cite book| url=https://archive.org/details/sonnetsandother00hillgoog| quote=robert hillyer.| title=The Wise Old Apple Tree in the Spring| publisher=Harvard University Press| year=1917 | first=Robert | last=Hillyer}}


===Novels===
===Novels===
* ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=7RAyAAAAIAAJ Riverhead]'' (Alfred Knopf, 1932)<ref>Hillyer, Robert. ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=7RAyAAAAIAAJ Riverhead]''. New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1932. via Google Books.</ref>
* ''Riverhead'' (1932)
* ''[https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b56666 My Heart for Hostage]'' (Random House, 1942)<ref>Hillyer, Robert, 1895-1961. ''[https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b56666 My Heart for Hostage]''. New York: Random House, 1942. via Hathi Trust.</ref> In 2022 this novel was digitized and made available for free download by Personville Press. <ref name="free-hostage">{{cite web |title=My Heart for Hostage (Free Novel) |url=https://www.personvillepress.com/11378h/random/hillyer/hillyer4410.html |website=Personville Press website |publisher=Personville Press |access-date=3 November 2022}}</ref>
* ''My Heart for Hostage'' (1942)


===Criticism===
===Criticism and scholarship===
* {{cite book| title=In Pursuit of Poetry| url=https://archive.org/details/inpursuitofpoetr00hill| url-access=registration| publisher=McGraw-Hill| year=1960 }}
* [[iarchive:inpursuitofpoetr00hill|''In Pursuit of Poetry'']] (McGraw-Hill, 1960)<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hillyer |first=Robert |url=http://archive.org/details/inpursuitofpoetr00hill |title=In pursuit of poetry |date=1960 |publisher=New York, McGraw-Hill |others=Internet Archive}}</ref>*
* First Principles of Verse. The Writer, 1950.<ref name="Vindicator obit" />
* ''[[iarchive:firstprincipleso0000hill|First Principles of Verse]].'' (The Writer, Inc., 1938).<ref name="Vindicator obit" />
* ''[[iarchive:somerootsofengli0000hill|Some Roots of English Poetry]]'' (Wheaton College Press, 1933)<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hillyer |first=Robert |url=http://archive.org/details/somerootsofengli0000hill |title=Some roots of English poetry |date=1933 |publisher=Norton, Mass. : Wheaton College Press |others=Internet Archive}}</ref>


===Editor and/or translator===
===Translations===
* {{cite book| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=g3cRAAAAYAAJ&q=robert+hillyer| title=A Book of Danish Verse: Translated in the Original Meters| author=Oluf Friis| others=Translators Samuel Foster Damon, Robert Hillyer| publisher=The American-Scandinavian Foundation| year=1922 }}
* {{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=g3cRAAAAYAAJ&q=robert+hillyer |title=A Book of Danish Verse: Translated in the Original Meters |author=Oluf Friis |others=Translators Samuel Foster Damon, Robert Hillyer |publisher=The American-Scandinavian Foundation |year=1922}}<ref name=":1" />
* Kahlil Gibran. ''A Tear and a Smile''.<ref>{{Cite web |title=A Tear And A Smile by Kahlil Gibran |url=https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks05/0500541h.html |access-date=2022-05-17 |website=gutenberg.net.au}}</ref> Introduction by Robert Hillyer. (A. A. Knopf, 1959).<ref>Gibran, Kahlil. 1965. ''[http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/977393365 A tear and a smile.] Translated from Arabic by H.M. Nahmad, with an introduction by Robert Hillyer''. New York: Knopf.</ref>

* ''Eight More Harvard Poets''. Edited by Samuel Foster Damon and Robert Hillyer. (Brentano, 1923)<ref>Damon, S. Foster, Robert Hillyer, Dorian Abbott, Norman Cabot, Grant Code, Malcolm Cowley, Jack Mereten, Joel T. Rogers, Royall H. Snow, and John Brooks. 1923. ''[http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1318413 Eight more Harvard poets]''.</ref>
⚫
===Editors===
* [https://archive.org/details/completepoetryse0000donn%20q7j5/mode/2up Complete Poetry and Selected Prose of John Donne and The Complete Poetry of William Blake], Introduction by Robert Hillyer, Random House: New York, 1941. pages xv-lv.
* {{cite book| title=A Tear and a Smile| author=Kahlil Gibran| editor=Hayim Musa Nahmad, Robert Hillyer| publisher=A. A. Knopf| year=1959 }}
* {{cite book| title=Eight More Harvard Poets| editor=Samuel Foster Damon, Robert Hillyer| publisher=Brentano's| year=1923 }}


== Personal ==
== Personal ==
In 1926, he married Dorothy Hancock Tilton.<ref name=":1" /> They had one son, but divorced in 1943.<ref name=":1" />

He was 66 when he died in [[Wilmington, Delaware]].<ref name="Vindicator obit" />
He was 66 when he died in [[Wilmington, Delaware]].<ref name="Vindicator obit" />


Line 88: Line 91:
== External links ==
== External links ==
{{wikisource-author}}
{{wikisource-author}}
* Robert Hillyer: ''[[iarchive:lp_recordings-of-poets-reading-their-own-poem_robert-hillyer|Recordings of Poets Reading their Own Poems]]''
* {{Gutenberg author |id=Hillyer,+Robert | name=Robert Hillyer}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=Robert Silliman Hillyer}}
* {{Librivox author |id=3016}}
* {{Librivox author |id=3016}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20060628130752/http://www.harvardsquarelibrary.org/poets/hillyer.php Brief biography at HarvardSquareLibrary.org]
* [https://library.udel.edu/special/findaids/view?docId=ead/mss0696.xml;tab=content#seriesi MSS 0696 - University of Delaware audio recordings of poetry readings]. Audio of various poetry readings Hillyer gave between 1953-1960.
* [https://library.udel.edu/special/findaids/view?docId=ead/mss0696.xml;tab=content#seriesi MSS 0696 - University of Delaware audio recordings of poetry readings]. Audio of various poetry readings Hillyer gave between 1953-1960.
* [https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/1795 Digital Works by Robert Hillyer on Project Gutenberg]

{{PulitzerPrize PoetryAuthors 1922–1950}}
{{PulitzerPrize PoetryAuthors 1922–1950}}


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[[Category:1895 births]]
[[Category:1895 births]]
[[Category:1961 deaths]]
[[Category:1961 deaths]]
[[Category:Pulitzer Prize for Poetry winners]]
[[Category:People from East Orange, New Jersey]]
[[Category:Kent School alumni]]
⚫
[[Category:Harvard University alumni]]
[[Category:Harvard Advocate alumni]]
[[Category:American Field Service personnel of World War I]]
[[Category:American Field Service personnel of World War I]]
[[Category:20th-century American poets]]
[[Category:20th-century American poets]]
[[Category:Danish–English translators]]
[[Category:Danish–English translators]]
[[Category:Harvard University alumni]]
[[Category:20th-century American translators]]
[[Category:Harvard University faculty]]
[[Category:Harvard University faculty]]
[[Category:Kent School alumni]]
[[Category:Trinity College (Connecticut) faculty]]
[[Category:St. Anthony Hall]]
[[Category:Pulitzer Prize for Poetry winners]]
[[Category:Kenyon College faculty]]
[[Category:Kenyon College faculty]]
[[Category:University of Delaware faculty]]
[[Category:Writers from East Orange, New Jersey]]
[[Category:Writers from East Orange, New Jersey]]
⚫
[[Category:University of Delaware faculty]]
[[Category:20th-century translators]]

Latest revision as of 04:11, 8 November 2024

Robert Hillyer
BornRobert Silliman Hillyer
(1895-06-03)June 3, 1895
East Orange, New Jersey, US
DiedDecember 24, 1961(1961-12-24) (aged 66)
Wilmington, Delaware, US
Occupationpoet, writer, university faculty
EducationHarvard University (BA)
Literary movementHarvard Aesthetes
Notable worksThe Collected Verse of Robert Hillyer
A Letter to Robert Frost and Others
Notable awardsPulitzer Prize in Poetry, 1934

Robert Silliman Hillyer (June 3, 1895 – December 24, 1961) was an American poet and professor of English literature.[1] He won a Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1934.[1]

Early life

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Hillyer was born in East Orange, New Jersey to an old Connecticut family.[2][3] He attended Kent School in Kent, Connecticut. After high school, he attended Harvard University, graduating cum laude in 1917.[1] While there, he was the editor of the literary magazine The Harvard Advocate, and was affiliated with the group known as the Harvard Aesthetes.[2]

When World War I began, he went to France and volunteered for the Norton-Harjes Ambulance Corps, along with Harvard classmate John Dos Passos.[1][2] Once the United States entered the war, he joined the American forces.[1] After serving as an ambulance driver, Hillyer later returned to France to work in the US Ordnance Department.[4] After the Armistice, Hillyer worked as a military courier for the 1919 peace conference in Paris. For a while Hillyer and John Dos Passos shared a flat in Paris and even collaborated on an unpublished novel which they called "Great Novel" (or "G.N.", or "Seven Times round the Walls of Jericho"). Eventually the novel was abandoned in 1921 even though Dos Passos said that Hillyer's contributions had "genuineness" and "more tone than mine."

Career

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Academic

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Hillyer became a professor of English at Harvard University in 1919.[1][2][3] In the late 1920s, he taught at Trinity College and was made a member of the Epsilon chapter of the literary fraternity St. Anthony Hall in 1927.

From 1937 to 1944, he was named to the Boylston Professorship of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard.[2] From 1948 to 1951 Hillyer was a visiting professor at Kenyon College.[1] He also taught at the University of Delaware from 1952 until his death.[1] While at Delaware Hillyer did various regular poetry readings between 1953-1960 which were recorded and are now available for listening through the university's archives.[5]

Over his academic life, Hillyer taught a number of writers (and poets) who later became well-known such as Theodore Roethke,[6] James Gould Cozzens, [7] Howard Nemerov, James Agee, Norman Mailer, Robert Fitzgerald and John Simon.[8]

Poet

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In 1919, Hillyer described himself as “a conservative and religious poet in a radical and blasphemous age."[3] In 1934, he received a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his book The Collected Verse of Robert Hillyer.[1][2] His work is in meter and often rhyme and he tended to write about death, love and nature.[1] He is known for his sonnets and for poems such as "Theme and Variations" (on his war experiences) and the light "Letter to Robert Frost."

He became president of the Conservative Poetry Society of America.[3] In this capacity, he attacked modernist poets such as T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound.[3]

Awards and honors

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Works

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Poetry

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Novels

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Criticism and scholarship

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Editor and/or translator

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  • Oluf Friis (1922). A Book of Danish Verse: Translated in the Original Meters. Translators Samuel Foster Damon, Robert Hillyer. The American-Scandinavian Foundation.[3]
  • Kahlil Gibran. A Tear and a Smile.[20] Introduction by Robert Hillyer. (A. A. Knopf, 1959).[21]
  • Eight More Harvard Poets. Edited by Samuel Foster Damon and Robert Hillyer. (Brentano, 1923)[22]
  • Complete Poetry and Selected Prose of John Donne and The Complete Poetry of William Blake, Introduction by Robert Hillyer, Random House: New York, 1941. pages xv-lv.

Personal

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In 1926, he married Dorothy Hancock Tilton.[3] They had one son, but divorced in 1943.[3]

He was 66 when he died in Wilmington, Delaware.[1]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o "Robert Hillyer, Pulitzer Poet". The Youngstown Vindicator. December 31, 1961. Retrieved December 26, 2012.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r "Robert Hillyer". Poetry Foundation. 2022-05-16. Retrieved 2022-05-17.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k "Robert Hillyer". Poets of Cambridge, U.S.A. Harvard Square Library. 2006-06-28. Archived from the original on June 28, 2006. Retrieved 2022-05-17.
  4. ^ Nagle, Robert. "Biographical Sketch of Robert Hillyer". My Heart For Hostage (Special Critical Edition). Personville Press. Retrieved 3 November 2022.
  5. ^ MSS 0696 - University of Delaware audio recordings of poetry readings , accessed Feb 26 2021
  6. ^ "Entry for Theodore Roethke". Encyclopedia.com. Cengage. Retrieved 30 July 2022.
  7. ^ McDonald, Roxanne (2021). "Robert Hillyer" (Entry). Salem Press Biographical Encyclopedia.
  8. ^ Blazek, William (1986). Norton-Harjes Ambulance Corps and American Literature of World War 1 (Dissertation). University of Aberdeen. p. 292.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  9. ^ Nagle, Robert (3 January 2024). "Book Announcement: Pre-Pulitzer Poetry". Idiotprogrammer: Texas Literary Blog. Personville Press. Retrieved 12 April 2024.
  10. ^ Hillyer, Robert (1957). The relic & other poems. Internet Archive. New York, Knopf.
  11. ^ Hillyer, Robert (1930). The gates of the compass : a poem in four parts together with twenty-two shorter pieces. Internet Archive. New York : Viking Press.
  12. ^ Hillyer, Robert (1928). The seventh hill. Internet Archive. New York : Viking Press.
  13. ^ "The Coming Forth By Day – Black's Fine Books & Manuscripts". Retrieved 2022-05-17.
  14. ^ Hillyer, Robert (1923). The Hills Give Promise: A Volume of Lyrics, Together with Carmus: a Symphonic Poem. B. J. Brimmer Company – via Google Play.
  15. ^ Hillyer, Robert. Riverhead. New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1932. via Google Books.
  16. ^ Hillyer, Robert, 1895-1961. My Heart for Hostage. New York: Random House, 1942. via Hathi Trust.
  17. ^ "My Heart for Hostage (Free Novel)". Personville Press website. Personville Press. Retrieved 3 November 2022.
  18. ^ Hillyer, Robert (1960). In pursuit of poetry. Internet Archive. New York, McGraw-Hill.
  19. ^ Hillyer, Robert (1933). Some roots of English poetry. Internet Archive. Norton, Mass. : Wheaton College Press.
  20. ^ "A Tear And A Smile by Kahlil Gibran". gutenberg.net.au. Retrieved 2022-05-17.
  21. ^ Gibran, Kahlil. 1965. A tear and a smile. Translated from Arabic by H.M. Nahmad, with an introduction by Robert Hillyer. New York: Knopf.
  22. ^ Damon, S. Foster, Robert Hillyer, Dorian Abbott, Norman Cabot, Grant Code, Malcolm Cowley, Jack Mereten, Joel T. Rogers, Royall H. Snow, and John Brooks. 1923. Eight more Harvard poets.
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