Irving Feldman
Irving Feldman (born on 22 September 1928 in Brooklyn, New York is an American poet and professor of English.

Academic career

Born and raised in Coney Island

Coney Island

Coney Island is a peninsula and beach on the Atlantic Ocean in southern Brooklyn, New York, United States. The site was formerly an outer barrier island, but became partially connected to the mainland by landfill....

, Brooklyn, Feldman worked as a merchant seaman, farm hand, and factory worker through his university education. After an undergraduate education at the City College of New York

City College of New York

The City College of the City University of New York is a senior college of the City University of New York , in New York City. It is also the oldest of the City University's twenty-three institutions of higher learning...

 (B.A., 1950), Feldman completed his Master of Arts

Master of Arts (postgraduate)

A Master of Arts from the Latin Magister Artium, is a type of Master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The M.A. is usually contrasted with the M.S. or M.Sc. degrees...

 degree at Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

 in 1953. His first academic appointments were at the University of Puerto Rico

University of Puerto Rico

The University of Puerto Rico is the state university system of Puerto Rico. The system consists of 11 campuses and has approximately 64,511 students and 5,300 faculty members...

 and the University of Lyon

University of Lyon

The University of Lyon , located in Lyon and Saint Etienne, France, is a center for higher education and research comprising 16 institutions of higher education...

 in France. Returning to the continental United States in 1958, he taught at Kenyon College

Kenyon College

Kenyon College is a private liberal arts college in Gambier, Ohio, founded in 1824 by Bishop Philander Chase of The Episcopal Church, in parallel with the Bexley Hall seminary. It is the oldest private college in Ohio...

 until 1964, when he was appointed professor of English at the State University of New York, Buffalo, where he was eventually appointed Distinguished Professor of English; he retired from teaching in 2004. In 1992 he was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship.

Published works

• Works and Days (1961)

• The Pripet Marshes (1965)

• Magic Papers (1970)

• Lost Originals (1972)

• Leaping Clear (1976)

• New and Selected Poems (1979)

• Teach Me, Dear Sister (1983)

• All of Us Here (1986)

• The Life and Letters (1994)

• Beautiful False Things: Poems (2000)

• Collected Poems, 1954-2004 (2004)