Poems of Humor and Protest (The Pocket Poets Series, No. 3)

48 pp. Kenneth Patchen was born into a poor family in Niles, Ohio. He moved to Wisconsin after high school and studied at the University of Wisconsin. He then held a variety of jobs as a migrant worker in the United States and Canada, and ended up in New York City, where, in 1936, he published his first book of poems, Before the Brave. His over 40 books of poetry include Wonderings (1971), But Even So (1968), Poems of Humor and Protest (1960), To Say If You Love Someone (1959), and Selected Poems (1946). In 1967, Patchen was recognized by the National Foundation on the Arts and Humanities for “a life-long contribution to American letters.” Largely a self-taught writer, Patchen never appeared to win widespread recognition from the professors at universities or many literary critics. As the New York Times Book Review noted, “While some critics tended to dismiss his work as naive, romantic, capricious and concerned often with the social problems of the 1930s, others found him a major voice in American poetry.”--Poetry Foundation