Raised in Manhattan, award winning poet and writer, Michael Blumenthal graduated from Cornell Law School. He practised law for four months before deciding to leave the legal world for others to deal with. For the following few years, Michael moved from one job to another. To date, he has written eight books of poetry, a novel, a memoir and a book of essays.
Award Winning Poet
During this transitional period, Michael wrote and concentrated his efforts on his passion for writing poetry. Eventually, in 1980, his book of poems, Sympathetic Magic, was published and won the 'Water Mark Poets of North America First Book Prize'.
Why was it published? "Because the judge liked it".
"What are the poems about?"
"Oh the usual stuff: love, sex, death".
After his first collection of poems reached the bookshelves, Michael was offered a teaching job at Harvard and stayed for eight years.
His second and third books of poems, Days We Would Rather Know and Against Romance were first published by Penguin in 1984 and 1987 respectively and reprinted recently by Pleasure Boat Studio: A Literary Press.
Other publications include Michael’s 1999 collection Dusty Angel, winner of the Isabella Gardner Prize and his seventh book of poems, And, 2009, both published by BOA Editions.
Distinctive Voice and Tone
Throughout his poems, Michael becomes an honest yet candid truth teller who exposes the class system, relationships, romantic yearnings and love’s disquieting bitter-sweetness via his sophisticated, witty, self-deprecatory, authentic tone. A distinctive calmness interspersed and interrupted by urbane, atypical word choice and metaphorical usage surprise and jolt the readers out of their gentle jaunt amongst his verse.
Prize Winning Author
Michael’s novel, Weinstock Among The Dying, Zoland Books, 1993, reprinted by Pleasure Boat Studio: A Literary Press, 2008, presents a satirical look at academic life through Martin Weinstock, a poet protagonist, a "discontented" Harvard professor, battling with his own history and identity, who “somewhere in the middle of his life’s journey, … [loses] his way and [finds] himself Burke-Howland Lecturer in Poetry at Harvard University”.
Weinstock took Michael five years to complete and was awarded the Hadassah Magazine’s Ribalow Prize for best work of Jewish fiction.
Non-Fiction and Essayist
Michael’s non-fiction works vary in style and topic. When History Enters the House: Essays from Central Europe, Pleasure Boat Studio: A Literary Press, 1998, presents extensive observations on contemporary Central Europe in a collection of fifty short essays composed during his four-year position in Hungary as a Fulbright fellow. In contrast, All My Mothers and Fathers: A Memoir, Harper Collins, 2002, changes focus and provides the reader with a deeply moving yet humorous remembrance of the writer’s youth.
Finding the Muse Within the Mood
When Michael writes he does not necessarily know where he is heading. Through his writing he tries to sort out confusions in his own life and he concentrates on subjects that concern or interest him passionately.
“I usually meditate about a problem. My work doesn’t convey any message. I wouldn’t know what message I could possibly give anyone”. He remarks.
Sometimes, Michael prefers to write essays but he goes through changes of moods which affect the type of writing he chooses to work on.
How to Succeed as a Writer
Advice Michael offers the writer:
"Read good work and pay attention to details. You must work at it. You must also have a passion for the psychological truth about the subject to be told. You must be interested in the problems of the characters, their concerns and the issues surrounding a story. The facts are easy to make up, but the difficulty is in understanding the psychological dilemmas in different situations”.
Poet, Author, Educator, Psychoanalyst, Editor, Translator, Lawyer
Since being the Copeland lecturer in poetry and Director of Creative Writing, from 1983 to 1992 at Harvard University, Michael has been a visiting professor of literature and creative writing at numerous universities across the USA and world-wide. At present, he is Visiting Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Immigration Clinic at The University of West Virginia College of Law.
Michael also contributes to newspapers and periodicals, including the 'New York Times', 'Time', 'The New Yorker', the 'Harvard Review', the 'Paris Review', and the 'Norton Anthology of Contemporary American Poetry' among others. A selection of his poetry appears in the anthology: The Harvard Book of Contemporary Poetry, Harvard University Press, 1985.
Michael frequently translates works from German, French, and Hungarian. He also holds psychotherapy sessions and enjoys spending time at his house by Lake Balaton in Hungary.
How does he see himself? "I’m just an ordinary guy from the States. I never wanted to be a snob of any kind, I’m just easy going”.
Read more about Michael Blumenthal, poet, author, essayist and memoirist on his website: Michael Blumenthal.com
Sources:
- Pleasure Boat Studio: A Literary Press
- Several personal and written interviews with Michael Blumenthal, 1996-2011.
Copyright +Lesley
Lesley Lanir - Freelance writer, lecturer and teacher trainer Lesley Lanir, writes on foreign language learning disorders, linguistics, and literature.
