Alan Dugan

Alan Dugan was an American poet known for blunt, witty and skeptical poems about war, work and everyday life. Born in Brooklyn, New York, he grew up in Jamaica, Queens. His studies at Queens College were interrupted when he was drafted into the army during the Second World War, and he later completed his degree at Mexico City College.

His first book, Poems (1961), was chosen for the Yale Series of Younger Poets and went on to win both the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. He continued the numbered series with Poems 2 (1963), Poems 3 (1967), Poems 4 (1974), Poems Five (1983) and Poems Six (1989). Poems Seven: New and Complete Poetry (2001) gathered his life's work with new poems and won the 2001 National Book Award for Poetry.

Dugan taught at Sarah Lawrence College and Connecticut College, among other schools, and helped found the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts. He lived for many years in Truro, on Cape Cod.