William Carlos Williams
- William Carlos Williams: BritannicaWilliam Carlos Williams, (born September 17, 1883, Rutherford, New Jersey, U.S.—died March 4, 1963, Rutherford), American poet who succeeded in making the ordinary appear extraordinary through the clarity and discreteness of his imagery...
- William Carlos Williams: Poetry FoundationWilliam Carlos Williams was born the first of two sons of an English father and a Puerto Rican mother of French, Dutch, Spanish, and Jewish ancestry, and he grew up in Rutherford, New Jersey. He was a medical doctor, poet, novelist, essayist, and playwright...
Research & Reference
- William Carlos Williams: Pennsylvania Center for the BookWilliam Carlos Williams was born to immigrant parents in Rutherford, New Jersey, on September 17, 1883. His father, William George, was British and had lived most of his life in the Virgin Islands, and his mother, Raquel, was Puerto Rican. William Carlos grew up with his parents, brother, his paternal grandmother, and his uncles. This upbringing greatly influenced his writing style later in life, which was made apparent when Williams wrote, "Of mixed ancestry, I felt from earliest childhood that America was the only home I could ever possibly call my own. I felt it was expressly founded for me, personally."..
- William Carlos Williams: Poetry ArchiveWilliam Carlos Williams (1883-1963) famously combined the two careers of doctor and writer, along the way founding a specifically American version of Modernism. He was born in Rutherford, New Jersey, the son of a New York businessman of British extraction and a Puerto Rican mother with artistic talent...
- William Carlos Williams Papers: Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript LibraryThe William Carlos Williams Papers document the life and work of poet, prose writer, dramatist, and physician William Carlos Williams. The papers consist of correspondence, writings, photographs, medical records, artwork, newspaper clippings and printed material, and personal papers...
William Carlos Williams
- William Carlos Williams"No ideas but in things," Williams's aesthetic dictum sought to capture, not analyze. A collage of documentary footage, interviews, animation, and dramatization capture the poet's often visual work and intense life. WARNING. Viewer Discretion Advised
Some language in this video may be offensive. This video contains nudity.
Author's Works & Perspectives
The Spanish American Roots of William Carlos Williams
As David Ignatow's foreword notes, the time is ripe for a multicultural canonical modernist, and Marzan himself, a poet with Puerto Rican roots, has produced an insightful study of Williams' sometimes hidden, sometimes obvious debt to his Spanish American heritage. At the same time, Marzan raises serious questions about how 'ethnic' literature shapes the modern canon. --American Literature I have been waiting for some time for a study of Williams's Latin American roots, and this book fills that bill. . . . It's a significant addition to the Williams canon. --Paul Mariani, author of William Carlos Williams: A New World Naked William Carlos Williams wrote from an all-encompassing American vision that recalls the spirit of Walt Whitman. Paradoxically, though, this most-American poet sprang from foreign roots--a Puerto Rican mother and a father who was an English-born Caribbean islander. In this poetically evocative work, Julio Marzan explores the Latin American roots of Williams' poetry. In particular, he focuses on the dualities and contradictions between Williams' public, North American persona, Bill, and his private, poetically encrypted Latin persona, Carlos. He shows how Williams' poetry draws on Latin American and Spanish sources, particularly the poetry of Spaniard Luis de Gongora, to encode a Latin subtext in poems that ostensibly present a mainstream, Anglo vision. These explorations uncover a wealth of complexity in Williams and his poetry. Reflecting the experience of many immigrants, his life and work embody the unreconcilable desires to assimilate and win acceptance in a new land while remaining separate and immersed in the beloved culture of one'sbirth. A published poet, Julio Marzan is also editor of Inventing a Word: An Anthology of Twentieth-Century Puerto Rican Poetry.
A River of Words
2009 Caldecott Honor Book An ALA Notable Book A New York Times Best Illustrated Children's Book A Charlotte Zolotow Honor Book NCTE Notable Children's Book When he wrote poems, he felt as free as the Passaic River as it rushed to the falls. Willie's notebooks filled up, one after another. Willie's words gave him freedom and peace, but he also knew he needed to earn a living. So he went off to medical school and became a doctor -- one of the busiest men in town! Yet he never stopped writing poetry. In this picture book biography of William Carlos Williams, Jen Bryant's engaging prose and Melissa Sweet's stunning mixed-media illustrations celebrate the amazing man who found a way to earn a living and to honor his calling to be a poet.
Ideas in Things
Surveys the World Bank's experience in supporting developing country civil service reforms and begins to assess the progress made. The World Bank recognizes the importance of the civil service to the general welfare of the 4.6 billion people in low and middle income countries. Between 1981 and 1991, civil service reform was a prominent feature of 90 World Bank lending operations. This paper surveys the Bank's experience in supporting this reform and assesses the progress made. The lending operations concentrated on two separate dimensions: (1) Shorter-term, emergency steps to reform public pay and employment policies, which center on measures to contain the cost and the size of the civil service (2) longer-term civil service strengthening efforts directed toward ongoing, sustained management improvements. After examining the record of these reforms, the authors conclude that the results have been mixed at best. They recommend greater emphasis on devising a coherent, far-reaching strategy for reform and on detailing the set of tactics by which these goals will be achieved.