John Felstiner
Casual portrait photograph of male, age appearing to be in 50's (chronologically 70's), with brown eyes, brown eyebrows, white hair and mustache, wearing white t-shirt and khaki shirt.
Felstiner at Stanford University in 2009
Websitecanpoetrysavetheearth.com

John Felstiner (July 5, 1936 – February 24, 2017), Professor Emeritus of English at Stanford University,[1] was an American literary critic, translator, and poet. His interests included poetry in various languages, environmental and ecologic poems, literary translation, Vietnam era poetry and Holocaust studies.[2] John Felstiner died in February 2017 at the age of 80. He had been suffering from the effects of progressive aphasia at his time of death, at a hospice near Stanford.

Biography

Felstiner was born in Mount Vernon, New York[3] and grew up in New York and New England. He graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy,[4] Harvard College, A.B. (magna cum laude), 1958, and Harvard University, Ph.D., 1965.[2]

From 1958 to 1961, he served on the USS Forrestal, in the Mediterranean.[5] Felstiner came to Stanford University in 1965 and was a professor of English at Stanford until his retirement in 2009. Felstiner is also known for writing, non academically but very movingly, of a former student of his, Elizabeth Wiltsee, in the late 60’s at Stanford. Pretty, precocious “Liz” Wiltsee had been a brilliant literature student, who declined into mental illness and homelessness, never fulfilling her great promise. She died around the age of 50, under mysterious circumstances.[5] While at Stanford, Felstiner was three times a fellow at Stanford Humanities Center; a Fulbright professor at University of Chile (1967–68); visiting professor at Hebrew University of Jerusalem (1974–75); and visiting professor of Comparative Literature and English at Yale University (1990, 2002).[2]

His collection of Paul Celan’s manuscripts, letters, and widespread context, along with Felstiner’s own translation archive, are housed at the Lilly Library, Indiana University, Bloomington.[6]

John and his wife, the writer, historian and professor Mary Lowenthal Felstiner, have two children: Sarah and Alek, and also two grandchildren.[7]

Selected works

Selected honors and awards

  • First Kenyon Review Prize in Criticism, for Max Beerbohm and the Wings of Henry James (1967) [8]
  • National Endowment for the Arts Literature and Translation Fellowships (1969, 1971, 1984, 2002) [9]
  • Rockefeller (1980), Guggenheim (1983), and National Endowment for the Humanities (1971, 1989) fellowships, and Bellagio Center (Rockefeller Foundation) Residency (1996) [2]
  • Translating Neruda: The Way to Macchu Picchu won the California Commonwealth Club Gold Medal for Non-fiction.[2]
  • Paul Celan: Poet, Survivor, Jew won the Truman Capote Prize for Literary Criticism and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle award and the Modern Language Association’s James Russell Lowell prize.[2]
  • Selected Poems and Prose of Paul Celan won translation prizes from the American Translators Association, Modern Language Association, and PEN West.[2]
  • Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 2005.[10]

References

  1. ↑ "Book of Members, 1780-2010: Chapter F" (PDF). American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 27 June 2012.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "The Human Experience: inside the humanities at Stanford University". Archived from the original on 16 December 2009. Retrieved 27 June 2012.
  3. ↑ "Encyclopedia.com Contemporary Authors". Retrieved 27 June 2012.
  4. ↑ "The Exeter Bulletin Fall 2009". Archived from the original on 28 January 2013. Retrieved 27 June 2012.
  5. 1 2 "Guide to the John Felstiner Papers". Retrieved 27 June 2012.
  6. ↑ "Lilly Library Manuscript Collections, Felstiner, John, MSS". Retrieved 27 June 2012.
  7. ↑ "V-LETTER: A STORY SURVIVED". Retrieved 17 October 2015.
  8. ↑ Felstiner, John (1967). "Kenyon Review". The Kenyon Review. 29 (4): 449–471. JSTOR 4334746.
  9. ↑ "National Endowment for the Arts Features Writers' Corner John Felstiner". Archived from the original on 17 September 2008. Retrieved 27 June 2012.
  10. ↑ "Professor John Felstiner". American Academy of Arts and Sciences. 26 April 2005. Retrieved 6 March 2016.

Selected interviews, book reviews, and articles

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.