James Radcliffe Squires

Radcliffe Squires

Mid 20th Century Poet

May 5, 1917 - February 14, 1993 Portrait of Radcliffe Squires, 1975 (Courtesy of Dana Gioia)

Radcliffe Squires (May 5, 1917 – February 14, 1993) was an American poet, writer, critic, and academic. He published several well-regarded books of poetry, as well as biographical and critical works which focused on highly acclaimed 20th-century writers.

Radcliffe Squires was born on May 5, 1917 in Salt Lake City, Utah. The son of a barber, he earned his bachelor's degree from the University of Utah in 1940. He served in the Navy during World War II, and completed his graduate studies after the war at the University of Chicago, where he received his master's degree and co-founded the literary magazine Chicago Review in 1946. He was awarded a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1952. After teaching at Dartmouth College, Squires joined the University of Michigan as an instructor of English language and literature in 1952, where he began a long teaching career. Following his retirement in 1982, Squires continued to teach seminars for first-year students and remained active as an essayist and reviewer. His work appeared in various magazines, such as The New Republic, The Hudson Review, Poetry, The Paris Review, and The Sewanee Review. Squires was also the author of seven books of poetry, one novel, and numerous critical books and essays. He accepted an invitation to read a number of his poems for audio recording and historical preservation at the Library of Congress on April 18, 1977, as part of the Archive of Recorded Poetry and Literature, sponsored by the Gertrude Clarke Whittall Poetry and Literature Fund. He served as the editor of the Michigan Quarterly Review.

Radcliffe Squires died in 1993 of an abdominal aneurysm at Ann Arbor University Hospital in Michigan at the age of 75. He outlived his wife, the former Eileen Mulholland, who died in 1976.