David Mason
Born and raised in Bellingham, Washington, David Mason has lived in many places. His books of poems began with The Buried Houses (winner of the Nicholas Roerich Poetry Prize), The Country I Remember (winner of the Alice Fay Di Castagnola Award), and Arrivals. His verse novel, Ludlow, was published in 2007 (2nd ed. 2010), and named best poetry book of the year by the Contemporary Poetry Review and the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum. It was also featured on the PBS News Hour and won the Colorado Book Award.
Mason’s memoir, News from the Village, appeared in 2010. Collections of his essays include The Poetry of Life and the Life of Poetry (2000), Two Minds of a Western Poet (2011), Voices, Places (2018) and Incarnation and Metamorphosis (2023). Mason has also co-edited several textbooks and anthologies, and his own work can be found in Best American Poetry, The Penguin Book of 20th Century American Poetry and others.
He has written the libretti for composer Lori Laitman’s opera of The Scarlet Letter, and her oratorio, Vedem. His opera with composer Tom Cipullo, After Life, won the 2017 Dominick Argento Prize for Best Chamber Opera from the National Opera Association, and was followed by Cipullo’s opera The Parting.
A former Fulbright Fellow to Greece, Mason served as Poet Laureate of Colorado from 2010 to 2014, and taught at Colorado College. He is a corresponding member of the Hellenic Authors Society. Recent books include Sea Salt: Poems of a Decade, Davey McGravy: Tales to Be Read Aloud to Children and Adult Children. The Sound: New and Selected Poems, and Pacific Light. Mason lives in Tasmania, the island state of Australia.
Here’s a book about David
The Colosseum Critical Introduction to David Mason, by Gregory Dowling, was published in 2023. Gregory Dowling is an associate professor at Universita Ca’ Foscari di Venezia, Italy.
In this book we learn a good deal about David Mason's life through his poetry: we learn of his family life and troubles, his travels, his loves, and his losses, but we never have the impression of being buttonholed by a man who is self-centered or egotistical. Partly this is because we are convinced of the numerous ways in which the life he recounts is connected to other lives, to places and to historical events. But it is mainly because we always sense how closely what he recounts is related to ourselves. As with all major poets, his voice becomes our own.
– adapted from the publisher’s notes