Mark Van Doren

Born in Hope, Illinois, in 1894, he became one of the most respected literary figures of his generation: a poet, critic, novelist, and longtime professor of English at Columbia University. He taught there for nearly four decades, earning a reputation as a gifted and generous teacher whose classes influenced many future writers.

His poetry was known for its formal grace and plainspoken intelligence, and in 1940 he won the Pulitzer Prize for Collected Poems, 1922–1938. Alongside poetry, he wrote essays, criticism, fiction, and works for younger readers, showing a range that made him feel at home in many parts of American literary life.

He died in 1972, but his reputation rests not only on the books he wrote. He is also remembered for the seriousness, curiosity, and humanity he brought to reading and teaching literature, qualities that helped make him an enduring presence in 20th-century American letters.