Ruth Stone


Ruth Stone was an American poet, author, and teacher.

Life and career

She was born in Roanoke, Virginia. She raised three daughters alone after her husband, professor Walter Stone, committed suicide in 1959. She wrote that her poems are "love poems, all written to a dead man" whose death caused her to "reside in limbo" with her daughters. For twenty years she traveled the US, teaching creative writing at many universities, including the University of Illinois, University of Wisconsin, Indiana University, University of California, Davis, Brandeis University, and finally settling at Binghamton University. She died at her home in Ripton, Vermont, on November 19, 2011.
Writer Elizabeth Gilbert tells a story about Stone's writing style and inspiration, which she had shared with Gilbert:

Writing

Ruth Stone is the author of thirteen books of poetry. She is the recipient of many awards and honors, including the 2002 National Book Award for Poetry, the 2002 Wallace Stevens Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Eric Mathieu King Award from The Academy of American Poets, a Whiting Award, two Guggenheim Fellowships , the Delmore Schwartz Award, the Cerf Lifetime Achievement Award from the state of Vermont, and the Shelley Memorial Award. In July 2007, she was named poet laureate of Vermont. Her most recent book of poetry, What Love Comes To: New and Selected Poems was a finalist for the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. The voice of Ruth Stone reading her poem "Be Serious" is featured in the film, USA The Movie. Paintbrush: A Journal of Poetry and Translation 27 was devoted entirely to Stone's work. The Ruth Stone Poetry Prize awarded by The Vermont College of Fine Arts and their literary journal Hunger Mountain is in its sixth year. Her work is distinguished by an unusual tendency to draw imagery and language from the natural sciences:

Legacy

Stone's long-time residence in Goshen, Vermont was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2016. Her heirs — including her granddaughter, poet and visual artist Bianca Stone — have established a foundation to convert the property into a writer's retreat.