Marya Zaturenska Biography

American poet, born in Kiev, Ukraine; she went to America with her family in 1909 and was naturalized in 1912. She was educated at Valparaiso University and the University of Wisconsin and subsequently worked as a newspaper feature writer. In 1925 she married the poet Horace Gregory, with whom she wrote the highly regarded critical survey A History of American Poetry, 1900–1940 (1969). Her first collection of poems, Threshold and Hearth (1934), was followed by Cold Morning Sky (1937; Pulitzer Prize, 1938). Zaturenska's work was characterized by its lyrical refinement and marked accomplishment in the use of traditional poetic forms; her imagery, particularly her expansive use of landscape, often displays considerable richness and power. Her subsequent collections include The Listening Landscape (1941), The Golden Mirror (1944), Terraces of Light (1960), Collected Poems (1965), and The Hidden Waterfall (1974). An increasingly devotional tendency is apparent i her later work. She was also the author of the critical biography Christina Rosetti (1949). Among the numerous works she edited is The Collected Poems of sara Teasdale (1964).