Dennis Schmitz

Dennis Schmitz (August 11, 1937 – September 12, 2019) was an American poet.^[1]

Life

Dennis Schmitz grew up in Dubuque, Iowa.^[2] He graduated from Loras College and the University of Chicago, where he met and married Loretta D'Agostino in 1960; they have five children together. He has taught at Illinois Institute of Technology, University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee^[3] and California State University, Sacramento.^[4] His former students include Raymond Carver,^[5] Charlene Ungstad,^[6] Gary Short,^[7] and Gary Thompson.^[8]

He opposes the

His work has appeared in the Alaska Quarterly Review,[11] American Poetry Review, The Nation, Paris Review,^[12] the Chicago Review,^[13] and Zyzzyva.^[14]

He resided in Sacramento.^[15]

Awards

• 2000–2002 Poet Laureate of Sacramento, California^[16]
• 1987–1988 Shelley Memorial Award^[17]
• Guggenheim Fellow^[18]
• 1976–1977, 1985–1986, 1992–1993 Fellow, National Endowment for the Arts

Works

Poetry

• Our Music (Gunpowder Press, 2022)
• Animism (Oberlin College Press, 2014)
• The Truth Squad (Copper Canyon Press, 2002)
• About Night: Selected and New Poems (Oberlin College Press, 1993)
• Eden (University of Illinois Press, 1989)
• Singing (Ecco Press, 1985)
• String (Ecco Press, 1980)
• Goodwill, Inc (1976)
• Double Exposures (1971)
• We Weep for Our Strangeness (1969)

Editor

• The Sacramento Anthology of 100 Poems. Sacramento’s Poet Laureate Program; Sacramento Metropolitan Arts Commission.

References