F. D. Reeve

Franklin D'Olier "F.D." Reeve (September 18, 1928 – June 28, 2013^[1]) was an American academic, writer, poet, Russian translator, and editor.^[2] He was also the father of "Superman" actor Christopher Reeve.^[3] He was the grandson of the first American Legion national commander, Franklin D'Olier.

Life and career

Reeve was born in Philadelphia, the son of Anne Conrad D'Olier and Richard Henry Reeve.^[4] He was brought up outside New York City. Reeve worked in the wheat fields for a while during college and, after graduation, was a Hudson River longshoreman for a while. He graduated from Princeton University (1950) and Columbia University (1958), and in 1961 was one of the first exchanges between the American Council of Learned Societies and the USSR Academy of Sciences. In the late summer of 1962 he accompanied Robert Frost to Russia for his meeting with Nikita Khrushchev, where Reeve served as Frost's translator.

Reeve started his academic career teaching Russian language and literature at Columbia University. After teaching at Columbia, Reeve moved to Wesleyan University in 1962 as chairman of the Russian Department. In 1967, he joined Wesleyan's inter-disciplinary College of Letters where he taught literature, humanities and creative writing until his retirement in 2002. During the course of his career he had visiting appointments at Oxford University, Yale, and Columbia.^[5]

Since 1994 he lived in Wilmington, Vermont with his wife, novelist Laura Stevenson. Reeve was an officer of the Poetry Society of America, the founding editor of "Poetry Review," the secretary of Poets House in its formative years, and was associated with the New England Poetry Club and the New York Quarterly. He published over two dozen books of poetry, fiction, criticism, and translation.

Reeve died on June 28, 2013 at Dartmouth Hitchcock Hospital in Lebanon, New Hampshire from complications from diabetes. He was 84 and is survived by his fourth wife, Laura C. Stevenson; his son Benjamin; his daughter, Alya, and two sons, Brock and Mark, all from his second marriage; two stepdaughters, Katharine O’Connell and Margaret Staloff; his sister, Anne Reeve Childs; his brother, Richard; and 18 grandchildren.^[1]

Awards

• New England Poetry Club's Golden Rose Award
• award in literature from the American Academy National Institute of Arts and Letters
• Lit.D. from New England College

Works

• "Venus, Half Dressed". AGNI. 51. 2000. 
• "The Old World". AGNI. 51. 2000. 
• "Barnyard". AGNI. 51. 2000. 
• "Coasting". The American Poetry Review. July 1995. 
• "The auctioneer". The New Criterion. 25: 32. October 2006. 

Poetry

• In the Silent Stones. New York: William Morrow. 1968. 
• The Blue Cat. New York: Farrar,Straus & Giroux. 1972. 
• Nightway. The Press at Colorado College. 1987. 
• Concrete Music. Amherst, MA: Pyncheon House. 1992. ISBN 978-1-881119-56-2. 
• The Moon and Other Failures. Michigan State University Press. 1999. ISBN 978-0-87013-514-9. 
• The Urban Stampede and Other Poems. Michigan State University Press. 2002. ISBN 978-0870135941. 
• A World You Haven't Seen: Selected Poems. New York: Rattapallax Press. 2002. ISBN 978-1-892494-48-1. 
• The Return of the Blue Cat. New York: Other Press. 2005. ISBN 978-1-59051-172-5. 
• The Toy Soldier. Calgary: Bayeux Arts. 2007. ISBN 978-1-896209-77-7. 
• The Blue Cat Walks the Earth. Washington, DC: Azul Editions. 2007. ISBN 978-1-885214-46-1. 
• The Blue Cat Walks the Earth. Middlesbrough: Smokestack Books. 2009. ISBN 978-0-9560341-0-6. 
• The Puzzle Master. NYQ Books. 2010. ISBN 978-1-935520-20-7. 

Fiction

• Nathaniel Purple. Voyage. 2012. ISBN 978-0-9826644-5-2. 
• North River: short stories. Azul Editions. 2006. ISBN 978-1-885214-33-1. 
• My Sister Life. Other Press. 2005. ISBN 978-1-59051-145-9. 
• A Few Rounds of Old Maid. Azul Editions. 1995. ISBN 1-885214-00-6. 
• White Colors. Farrar Straus and Giroux. 1973. ISBN 0-374-28927-1. 
• The Brother. Farrar Straus and Giroux. 1971. 
• Just Over The Border. William Morrow. 1969. 
• The Red Machines. William Morrow. 1968. 

Criticism

• The White Monk:An Essay on Dostoevsky and Melville. Vanderbilt University Press. 1989. ISBN 0826512348. 
• The Russian Novel. McGraw Hill. 1966. 
• Robert Frost in Russia. Atlantic-Little,Brown. 1964. 
• Aleksandr Blok: Between Image and Idea. Columbia University Press. 1962. 

Translations

• The Garden, New and Selected Poetry and Prose by Bella Akhmadulina. Henry Holt and Co. 1990. 
• Contemporary Russian Drama. Pegasus. 1968. 
• Anthology of Russian Plays, volume 2, 1890-1960. Vintage Books. 1963. 
• Anthology of Russian Plays, volume 1, 1790-1890. Vintage Books. 1961. 

Oratorio

• "The Urban Stampede", with music by Andrew Gant, London’s Barbican 2000

References

External links

• "Interview with F. D. Reeve", Cervena Barva Press
• "Interview with The New York Quarterly", New Hampshire Public Radio
• Author's website