John B. Logan was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 poet

Poet

A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...

 and teacher.

Logan was born in Red Oak, Iowa. He earned a bachelor's degree from Coe College

Coe College

Coe College is a private, four-year, liberal arts college in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Founded in 1851, the institution is historically affiliated with the Presbyterian Church . Its current president is James R. Phifer. It is one of the smaller universities to have a chapter of Phi Beta Kappa...

, his master's degree from the Iowa University, and did graduate work at Georgetown University

Georgetown University

Georgetown University is a private, Jesuit, research university whose main campus is in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic university in the United States...

 and the University of Notre Dame

University of Notre Dame

The University of Notre Dame du Lac is a Catholic research university located in Notre Dame, an unincorporated community north of the city of South Bend, in St. Joseph County, Indiana, United States...

 in philosophy.

He authored over 14 books of poetry and essays including Spring of the Thief (1963) and Only the Dreamer Can Change the Dream, which won the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize in 1982. The poet Hayden Carruth

Hayden Carruth

Hayden Carruth was an American poet and literary critic. He taught at Syracuse University.-Life:Hayden Carruth grew up in Woodbury, Connecticut, and was educated at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and at the University of Chicago. He lived in Johnson, Vermont for many years...

 has written that Logan was responsible for "creating a new lyricism" through his poetry.

Logan taught at many colleges and universities including Saint John's College in Annapolis, University of Notre Dame

University of Notre Dame

The University of Notre Dame du Lac is a Catholic research university located in Notre Dame, an unincorporated community north of the city of South Bend, in St. Joseph County, Indiana, United States...

, Saint Mary's College

Saint Mary's College of California

Saint Mary's College of California is a private, coeducational college located in Moraga, California, United States, a small suburban community about east of Oakland and 20 miles east of San Francisco. It has a 420-acre campus in the Moraga hills. It is affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church...

 in California, and, finally at the State University of New York, Buffalo. His many students include the poets Marvin Bell

Marvin Bell

Marvin Bell is an American poet and teacher who was the first Poet Laureate of the State of Iowa.Bell was born in New York City and raised in Center Moriches, Long Island...

 and Bill Knott.

He was the poetry editor for The Nation

The Nation

The Nation is the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States. The periodical, devoted to politics and culture, is self-described as "the flagship of the left." Founded on July 6, 1865, It is published by The Nation Company, L.P., at 33 Irving Place, New York City.The Nation...

and Critic

Critic

A critic is anyone who expresses a value judgement. Informally, criticism is a common aspect of all human expression and need not necessarily imply skilled or accurate expressions of judgement. Critical judgements, good or bad, may be positive , negative , or balanced...

. He also founded and co-edited Choice.

Logan died on November 6, 1987, in San Francisco, CA.

Honors

• Rockefeller Foundation grant
• Morton Dauwen Zabel Award
• 1979 Guggenheim Fellowship
  Guggenheim Fellowship
  Guggenheim Fellowships are American grants that have been awarded annually since 1925 by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the arts." Each year, the foundation makes...
  
  
• 1981 Lenore Marshall/Nation Poetry Prize.
• Wayne State University's Miles Modern Poetry Prize

Poetry

• A Cycle for Mother Cabrini, (1955)
• Ghosts of the Heart, (1960)
• Spring of the Thief: Poems 1960-1962, (1963)
• The Anonymous Lover: New Poems, W. W. Norton & Company, 1973, ISBN 9788714008475
• The Zig Zag Walk: Poems 1963-1968, (1973)
• The Bridge of Change: Poems 1974-1980, (1979)
• Only the Dreamer Can Change the Dream: Selected Poems, (1981)
• The Transformation: Poems January to March 1981, (1983)
• John Logan: The Collected Poems, BOA Editions, Ltd., 1989, ISBN 9780918526656

Prose

• The House That Jack Built: or, A Portrait of the Artist as a Sensualist, (1974)
• China, Old and New, (1982)
• A Ballet for the Ear: Interviews, Essays, and Reviews, (1983)
• John Logan: The Collected Fiction, (1991)

Reviews

FEW of the American poets now in their 50's have placed the personal, the psychological, as squarely at the center of their work as the preceding generation, that of Lowell and Berryman, did. John Logan -three decades of whose work are brought together in these two books - is one of the few.

External links