Getting to know Elizabeth Bishop
Gate in front of the Elizabeth Bishop House. Photo by Mark Hedden.
The Key West Literary Seminar is nearing the home stretch of our restoration of the Elizabeth Bishop House here in Key West. It’s a beautiful place and, more importantly, will honor one of Key West’s — and America’s — greatest writers.
Maybe you are not that familiar with Bishop. Despite having recently graduated with a degree in English, neither was I in 1993 when the Key West Literary Seminar focused entirely on her. It was a revelation. Here are my suggestions for getting to know more about Bishop and her work.*
“Elizabeth Bishop in Key West, Island of Her Dreams” - excerpt from “Love Unknown: The Life and Words of Elizabeth Bishop” by Thomas Travisano
Poems:
“Florida”
“The Fish”
“The Bight”**
“One Art”
“Sunday at Key West”
“Key West”
“It Is Marvelous To Wake Up Together”
Essays:
“Gregorio Valdez”
“Mercedes Hospital”
Letters:
There are many from Key West between 1938 and 1948, but this might be my favorite, from a February 5, 1940 letter to Marianne Moore:
“I have one Key West story that I must tell you. It is more like the place than anything I can think of. The other day I went to the china closet to get a little white bowl to put some flowers in and when I was rinsing it, I noticed some little black specks. I said to Mrs. Almyda, ‘I think we must have mice’ – but she took the bowl over to the light and studied it and after a while she said, ‘No, them’s lizard.’”
Paintings:
Bishop captured many Key West landmarks, including the cemetery, the Harris School, the Armory and the County Courthouse.
Books:
Elizabeth Bishop: Poems, Prose and Letters (Library of America)
One Art: Elizabeth Bishop letters (selected and edited by Robert Giroux)
Love Unknown: The Life and Worlds of Elizabeth Bishop by Thomas Travisano
Exchanging Hats: Elizabeth Bishop Paintings
Elizabeth Bishop: The Complete Poems: 1927-1979
Elizabeth Bishop: The Collected Prose
*This list is entirely by me (Nancy Klingener) and should not be considered a representation of the Key West Literary Seminar or the Monroe County Public Library
** The last line from this poem, “All the untidy activity continues / awful but cheerful” is the epitaph on Bishop’s gravestone in Worcester, Mass.
Elizabeth Bishop’s gravestone in Worcester, Massachusetts. Photo by Nancy Klingener.