Kenneth Koch

Kenneth Koch (27 February 1925 - 6 July 2002) was an American poet, playwright, and professor, active from the 1950s until his death at age 77. He was a prominent poet of the "New York School" of poetry, a loose group of poets including Frank O'Hara and John Ashbery that eschewed contemporary introspective poetry in favor of an exuberant, cosmopolitan style that drew major inspiration from travel, painting, and music.

Selected works

Poetry

• Ko (1960)
• Thank You (1962)
• When the Sun Tries to Go On (1969)
• The Pleasures of Peace (1969)
• The Art of Love (1975)
• The Duplications (1977)
• The Burning Mystery of Anna in 1951 (1979)
• Days and Nights (1982)
• On the Edge (1986)
• Seasons on Earth (1987)
• One Train (1994) (Bollingen Prize winner)
• On The Great Atlantic Rainway: Selected Poems 1950-1988 (1994) (Bollingen Prize winner)
• Straits (1998)
• New Addresses (2000) (Phi Beta Kappa Poetry Award winner, National Book Award finalist)
• Sun Out (2002)
• A Possible World (2002)

Poetry education

• Wishes, Lies, and Dreams: Teaching Children to Write Poetry (1970)
• I Never Told Anybody: Teaching Poetry Writing in a Nursing Home (1978)
• Sleeping on the Wing : An Anthology of Modern Poetry with Essays on Reading and Writing (1982)
• Rose, Where Did You Get That Red? : Teaching Great Poetry to Children (1990)
• The Art of Poetry: Poems, Parodies, Interviews, Essays, and Other Work (1997)
• Making Your Own Days: The Pleasures of Reading and Writing Poetry (1998)

Drama

• A change of hearts; plays, films, and other dramatic works, 1951-1971 (1973)
• 1000 Avant-Garde Plays (1988)
• The Gold Standard : A Book of Plays (1998)

Prose

• The Red Robins (1975)
• Hotel Lambosa and Other Stories (1998)