MAKE FOREVER NOW

Mitchell explores the life and art of 20th-century American poet Jean Garrigue.

The author opens his biography by praising his subject as one of the best poets of her generation. Garrigue—born Gertrude Louise Garrigus in Indiana in 1912—was, from the start, an energetic and “venturesome” girl, Mitchell writes, as well as an ambitious idealist. Growing up amid the emergence of Modernism, she quickly aspired to live in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village. Her older sister, Marjorie, encouraged her artistic potential, and, after moving to New York with her own husband, she immediately made plans to take her sister in. From there, Garrigue was set on the path of a creative writer and poet; “Freedom, Feminism, Ecstasy, and Travel” became aspects of her emerging aesthetic. A Romantic style persisted in her writing, notes Mitchell, even as she embraced the “vision of life” that the Modernist movement offered. She changed her name in 1940, and three years later, she completed a master of fine arts degree at the then-emerging Iowa Writers’ Workshop. From there, she split her time between teaching college students and traveling extensively throughout Europe. A Guggenheim Fellowship in 1960 cemented her reputation as a poet and offered her the validation she needed after a period of mixed reviews. Mitchell takes care to examine her complex friendships with other writers and artists, particularly with Josie Herbst. Their relationship was often tempered by periods of uneasiness, and by the mid-1960s, their relationship dynamic had soured—specifically due to what Herbst considered to be Garrigue’s self-centeredness. It’s unclear whether the poet ever fully recovered from Herbst’s death at the beginning of 1969, and three years later, Garrigue herself fell ill, and her friends rallied around her; in her final days, it was reported that “Jean had shown great fortitude, never complaining and facing up to her doom.”

Throughout this biography, Mitchell writes with an immense degree of detail and care. Via a careful curation of Garrigue’s letters, he brings the poet to life as a woman “pulsing with the passion of creation,” for whom art always came first. Adept and insightful analysis of her poetry is woven through the text (“‘Continuation’ opened a chance for her to inhabit the childlike innocence she often sought in her work”), and details of her friendships and sexuality always touch on how the people around her affected the “center of herself as [an] artist.” The author seems hesitant to delve too far into speculation about Garrigue’s motives and intentions, but his insights are often astute and authoritative. He invites readers to consider how her life affected her poetry, even when details are scarce, as when he comments that a piece of her writing is “certainly written in gratitude and love for things it would be worth knowing more about.” The historical context he provides is consistently relevant, as are his explanations of the artistic scenes and schools of which Garrigue was a part. His concluding note is one of respect, bordering on reverence.

An authoritative and compelling remembrance of an underappreciated poet.