Donald Hall, Celebrated Poet, Dies at 89

 

Donald Hall, American poet, writer, editor, critic, and teacher, passed away on June 23, 2018 at his family farmhouse in Wilmot, NH.

Hall’s poetry and prose focused on simple language to evoke complex universal themes. His work glows with the affection he held for the land, the people, and the customs of rural New England, and especially for the small New Hampshire dairy farm near Ragged Mountain he visited every summer as a child.

Hall published fifteen books of poetry along with multiple collections of essays, children’s books, and plays. He was widely accomplished, receiving two Guggenheim Fellowships and the Robert Frost Medal, and served as the fourteenth U.S. Poet Laureate from 2006-2007.

Four of Hall’s children’s books – Christmas at Eagle Pond, Lucy’s Christmas, Lucy’s Summer, and The Man Who Lived Alone – are published by Godine, along with two collections of his essays – String Too Short to be Saved and On Eagle Pond. His writing often calls to the desire for a simpler, gentler way of life, one he found rooted in the rhythms of his beloved farm at Eagle Pond.

He will be dearly missed by his friends at Godine.

To read the New York Times obituary for Hall, please follow this link.

To read the Boston Globe obituary, please follow here.