Being a scholar, a teacher, an editor, a critic,
and from our point of view, most important, a poet.
Mr. Ransom was born, as you probably know,
in Pulaski, Tennessee.
He received his undergraduate degree at Vanderbilt,
in Nashville.
And then spent about three years in England as a Rhodes scholar.
Receiving his bachelor's in classics and philosophy.
As one of my students once remarked, isn't it remarkable
that Mr. Ransom has been able to write the poetry
he has with no background except the classics.
[LAUGHTER]
Between the years 1914 and 1937, Mr. Ransom
went back to his Alma mater in Nashville
as Professor of English, especially
as Professor of poetry.
And he started there a pattern which has
grown with him with the years.
First of all, I think a great many of the people
who have worked with him think of him as a teacher,
and a remarkable teacher and inspirer
in their writing of poetry.
Such people as Clint Brooks, as Robert Penn Warren,
as Alan Tate, are simply of course
the ones we know about among many.
At Vanderbilt, he was one of the founders of the Fugitive
Magazine, which published some of the important verse
of its period and had a distinguished group
of Southern poets contributing to it.
He was also instrumental in the development of the Agrarian
Group, which put the emphasis on agrarian cultivation culture
as it is shown in literature, rather than on the machine.
Offhand, I can't think of poetry that you might know quite so
well as some of the short stories,
for example, of Robert Penn Warren, where the agrarian
atmosphere and emphasis is very plain.
Mr. Ransom's own poetry, some of the best of it
and a considerable amount of it, was written and contributed
to the Fugitive.
And except for his two years in France as a Lieutenant
in the artillery, the period between 1914 and 1937,
he spent at Vanderbilt. From about 1938
until his retirement in 1958, he has been at Kenyon College
in Gambier, Ohio.
Where he is at present living.
And the pattern goes on.
Again, the teaching, which I mention
because I know that some of you are very much
interested in creative writing.
Mr. Ransom, a poet, of course first,
has put considerable emphasis on developing
that side of his teaching.
He founded, and for many years edited,
the Kenyon Review, which I think I
hardly need to mention to you because it made its name first
all over the country and then outside the borders
of the United States with the remarkable collection
of fiction, of poetry, and of criticism.
Mr. Ransom has also been, as you know, in not only a poet,
but a critic of note.
Making such contributions to criticism
while he was at Kenyon and elsewhere.
That his name is always associated with criticism.
And he has so endeared his Alma mater to others,
and has brought it to such attention
that the administration building at Kenyon
has been named in his honor.
I don't know quite what we would do along those lines here,
but we might be thinking.
Mr. Ransom has five books of poetry to his credit,
as the reporters always say.
Poems about God, an early book which some of us think
has some very good things in it, though he has not chosen them
for later reproduction.
In 1924, Chills And Fever, in 1927,
A True Gentleman In Bonds.
And then, what I think is interesting
with an 18-year period between in both cases,
The Selected Poems Of 1945, and The Selected Poems Of 1963.
From which I hope he will read to us tonight.
He also has considerable criticism,
which has been collected in about three volumes.
God Without Thunder, in 1930.
The World's Body in 1938.
And in 1941, The Volume, which gave its name
to a whole new attitude toward criticism.
And was called simply, The New Criticism.
I always feel that it is a little bit too presumptuous
to speak of awards in connection with people
of Mr. Ransom's caliber.
But, of course, he has won all the major ones.
The Guggenheim Fellowship, the Honorary Consultant-ship
to the Library of Congress, the Bollinger award from Yale,
an award from the Arts and Letters Society.
And in 1964, the National Book Award in poetry.
In the spring of '33, the Shenandoah Review
got out an issue which is dedicated to Mr. Ransom.
At that time, Alan Tate, an old pupil and old friend
said, I consider Mr. Ransom now the Dean of American Poets.
It is with the greatest pride and a sense of honor
that we present Mr. John Crowe Ransom.
[APPLAUSE]