Discipline: Literature – poetry

William Benet

Discipline: Literature – poetry
MacDowell fellowships: 1921, 1923, 1924, 1925, 1930, 1931, 1934, 1936, 1938, 1940
William Rose Benét (1886 –1950) was an American poet, writer, and editor. He was the older brother of Stephen Vincent Benét and younger brother to Laura Benét, who were both Fellows at the MacDowell. He was born in Brooklyn, New York, the son of Col. James Walker Benét and his wife, Frances Neill (née Rose), and grandson of Brigadier General Stephen Vincent Benét. He was educated The Albany Academy in Albany, NY and at Sheffield Scientific School of Yale University, graduating with a Ph.B. in 1907. At Yale, he edited and contributed light verse to campus humor magazine The Yale Record, as did his younger brother a number of years after. He began the Saturday Review of Literature in 1924 and continued to edit and write for it until his death. In 1942, he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his book of autobiographical verse, The Dust Which Is God (1941). His brother Stephen Vincent Benét was awarded the same prize two years later in 1944. Benét is also the author of The Reader's Encyclopedia, a standard American guide to world literature. Today he is perhaps best known as the author of "The Skater of Ghost Lake," a poem frequently assigned in American schools for its use of onomatopoeia and rhythm as well as its tone of dark mystery.