About Rita

About Rita

Rita: in detail

Rita Dove was born in Akron, Ohio. Her father, Ray A. Dove, was a chemist, and a pioneer of integration in American industry. Her household also consisting of herself, two younger sisters, an older brother and her mother. Both of her parents encouraged persistent study and wide reading. From an early age, Rita loved poetry and music. She played cello in her high school orchestra, and led her high school's majorette squad. As one of the most outstanding high school graduates of her year, she was invited to the White House as a Presidential Scholar. A quote from Ms. Dove,“My parents instilled in us the feeling that learning was the most exciting thing that could happen to you, and it never ends, and isn't that great.”

At Miami University in Ohio, she began to pursue writing seriously. After graduating summa cum laude with a degree in English in 1973, she won a Fulbright Scholarship to study in Germany for two years at the University of Tubingen. She then joined the famous Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa, receiving her Masters' Degree in 1977. At Iowa, she met another Fulbright scholar, a young writer from Germany named Fred Viebahn. They were married in 1979. Their daughter Aviva was born in 1983.

Click here to meet Rita's Husband

From 1981 to 1989, Rita Dove taught creative writing at Arizona State University. Appearances in magazines and anthologies had won national acclaim for Rita Dove before she published her first poetry collection, The Yellow House on the Corner in 1980. It was followed by Museum (1983) and Thomas and Beulah, (1986) a collection of interrelated poems loosely based on the life of her grandparents.

Thomas and Beulah won the 1987 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. In 1993, Rita Dove was appointed to a two-year term as Poet Laureate of the United States and Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress. She was the youngest person, and the first African-American, to receive this highest official honor in American letters. In the fall of 1994, she read her poem, Lady Freedom Among Us, at the ceremony commemorating the 200th anniversary of the U.S. Capitol.



Ritas Publications Ten Poems (chapbook) - 1997 The Only Dark Spot in the Sky The Yellow House on the Corner - 1980 Mandolin (chapbook) - 1982 Museum - 1983 Fifth Sunday (short stories) - 1985 Thomas and Beulah - 1986 The Other Side of the House - 1988 Grace Notes - 1989 Through the Ivory Gate (novel) - 1992 Selected Poems - 1993 Lady Freedom Among Us - 1993 The Darker Face of the Earth: A Verse Play in Fourteen Scenes - 1994 Mother Love: Poems - 1995 Multicultural Voices: Literature from the United States (non-fiction) - 1995 The Poets World (essays) - 1995 On the Bus with Rosa Parks - 1999

Other publications by Rita Dove include a book of short stories, Fifth Sunday, the poetry collections Grace Notes, Selected Poems and Mother Love, and the novel Through the Ivory Gate.

Her verse drama, The Darker Face of the Earth had its world premiere at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in the 1986. Another production of the play appeared at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington D.C., in 1997.

Rita Dove and former President Jimmy Carter welcomed an unprecedented gathering of Nobel Laureates in Literature to Atlanta, Georgia for the Cultural Olympiad held in conjunction with the 1996 Olympic Games.

Rita Dove's lifelong interest in music has taken other forms. Her song cycle "Seven For Luck" with music by John Williams, is featured on a PBS television special with the Boston Symphony.

Also in 1996, a symphonic work for orchestra and narrator -- "Umoja -- Each One of Us Counts," -- was performed at Atlanta's Symphony Hall with Rita Dove's text performed by former Mayor and U.N. Ambassador Andrew Young.

In her spare time, she studies classical voice and practices the viola da gamba, a 17th century forerunner of the modern cello.

Today, Rita Dove is Commonwealth Professor of English at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, where she lives with her husband and daughter.

Rita Dove has brought her poetry to television audiences through her appearances on CNN and NBC's Today Show.

Today, Rita Dove is Commonwealth Professor of English at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, where she lives with her husband and daughter.

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