Richard Michelson
Richard Michelson was born on July 3, 1953, in Brooklyn, New York. He grew up in East New York, a neighborhood in Brooklyn.
Michelson is the author of five poetry collections: Sleeping as Fast as I Can (Slant Books, 2023); More Money than God (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2015); Battles & Lullabies (University of Illinois Press, 2006); Masks (The Gehenna Press, 1999); and Tap Dancing for the Relatives (University of Central Florida Press, 1985).
In addition to his poetry collections, Michelson has also published more than a dozen award-winning children’s books. He also wrote the libretto for the off-Broadway music-theater piece Dear Edvard.
Michelson is the winner of a National Jewish Book Award, two Sydney Taylor Gold Medals from the Association of Jewish Libraries, and two Massachusetts Cultural Council Fellowships. His work was chosen to represent the Commonwealth of Massachusetts at the Library of Congress National Book Festival, and in 2019, he was awarded the Samuel Minot Jones Award for Lifetime Literary Achievement.
Of Battles and Lullabies, Richard Wilbur says, “The poems of this book ask with urgent eloquence how the sweetness of life can be sheltered from the terrors of our time.” In his review of More Money than God, Martín Espada writes, “Some poets wrestle with ghosts. Richard Michelson invites them to sit at the kitchen table, crack jokes, give advice, live and die all over again. By turns philosophical, political, tender, outraged, and funny as hell, Richard Michelson is a poet to remember.” Of his latest book, Patricia Spears Jones writes: “Sleeping as Fast as I Can brings prayers, rants, memoria and rage against hatred, violence, racism, and antisemitism in a
bitches brew of language on every page.”
Michelson served as poet laureate of Northampton, Massachusetts, from 2012–15. He currently hosts Northampton Poetry Radio and owns R. Michelson Galleries.
