Jack Hirschman

Biography

Born in New York City, Hirschman received a Bachelor of Arts from City College of New York in 1955, and an AM and PhD from Indiana University in 1957 and 1961, respectively. While attending City College, he worked as a copy boy for the Associated Press. When he was 19, he sent a story to Ernest Hemingway, who responded: "I can't help you, kid. You write better than I did when I was 19. But the hell of it is, you write like me. That is no sin. But you won't get anywhere with it." Hirschman left a copy of the letter with the Associated Press, and when Hemingway killed himself in 1961, the "Letter to a Young Writer" was distributed by the wire service and published all over the world.

Hirschman married Ruth Epstein, whom he'd met and dated when they were students at CCNY, in 1954. Following graduation, Ruth became a program director for National Public Radio and eventually general manager of Santa Monica public radio station KCRW. The couple had two children. In the 1950s and 60s, Jack Hirschman taught at Dartmouth College and University of California, Los Angeles. During his tenure as professor at UCLA one of the students enrolled in his class was Jim Morrison, later to be a cofounder and lead vocalist of the American band The Doors. The Vietnam War, however, put an end to Hirschman's academic career; he was fired from UCLA after encouraging his students to resist the draft. His marriage disintegrated, and he moved to San Francisco in 1973. Eventually, Ruth remarried and became Ruth Hirschman Seymour, continuing her long association with KCRW.

His first volume of poetry, published in 1960, included an introduction by Karl Shapiro: "What a relief to find a poet who is not afraid of the vulgar or the sentimental, who can burst out laughing or cry his head off in poetry – who can make love to language, or kick it in the pants."

For a quarter century, Hirschman has roamed San Francisco streets, cafes (including Caffe Trieste, where he has been a regular patron), and readings, becoming an active street poet and a peripatetic activist. Hirschman is also a painter and collagist, and has translated over two dozen books from German, French, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Albanian, and Greek.

He is an assistant editor at the left-wing literary journal Left Curve and is a correspondent for The People's Tribune. Among his many volumes of poetry are A Correspondence of Americans (Indiana U. Press, 1960), Black Alephs (Trigram Press, 1969), Lyripol (City Lights, 1976), The Bottom Line (Curbstone, 1988), and Endless Threshold (Curbstone, 1992). According to a 2006 book review, Hirschman is a Stalinist. Hirschman translated the youthful poems of Joseph Stalin into English (Joey: The Poems of Joseph Stalin [Deliriodendron Press, 2001]).

In June 1999, Hirschman married the Swedish poet, writer and artist Agneta Falk. In 2006, Hirschman released his most extensive collection of poems yet, The Arcanes. Published in Salerno, Italy by Multimedia Edizioni, The Arcanes comprises 126 long poems spanning 34 years.

Additionally, in 2006, Hirschman was appointed Poet Laureate of San Francisco by Mayor Gavin Newsom. In his Poet Laureate inaugural address, Hirschman envisioned creating an International Poetry Festival in San Francisco, reprising a great tradition from the City's literary past.

In July 2007, Friends of the San Francisco Public Library, Mayor Gavin Newsom, Hirschman and the San Francisco Public Library presented their first San Francisco International Poetry Festival.

Hirschman was named Poet-in-Residence with Friends of the San Francisco Public Library in 2009 and currently holds that status. Hirschman continues his work supporting the literary community and is the key organizer for the now biennial San Francisco International Poetry Festival.

Since the 2007 Festival, Hirschman, in partnership with Friends of the San Francisco Public Library and the San Francisco Public Library, have presented smaller poetry festivals in a variety of languages, including the Latino Poetry Festival, the Vietnamese Poetry Festival and the Iranian Arts Poetry Festival.

Hirschman is active with the Revolutionary Poets Brigade and curates the Poets 11 Anthology, which collects poetry from each of the City's 11 districts.