Pulitzer Prize-winning Poet Claudia Emerson, 57, Has Died

December 8, 2014

Claudia EmersonOn Thursday, former Virginia Poet Laureate Claudia Emerson died due to complications from colon cancer. She was the author of a number of collections of poetry, including Late Wife, which won the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in poetry, and she taught at Mary Washington University in Fredericksburg, Virginia, and, more recently, at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond. Emerson was a recent member of the AWP Board of Trustees, serving as representative of member programs in the Southeast.

“I think Claudia is one of the finest American poets of her generation,” said David Wojahn to the Richmond Times-Dispatch last September. “W.H. Auden said more poets fail for lack of character than lack of talent. Claudia has plenty of character.”

Though she only lived in Richmond briefly, after joining the VCU faculty in 2013, she was prolific in her writing, leading to the completion of two new volumes of poetry, which are scheduled for publication by Louisiana State University Press in 2015.

For more, read the Times-Dispatch’s obituary at timesdispatch.com.

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