RAKOSI, Carl 1903-2004

OBITUARY NOTICE—

See index for CA sketch: Born November 6, 1903, in Berlin, Germany; died June 24, 2004, in San Francisco, CA. Psychologist, social worker, and author. A psychologist and social worker by training, Rakosi was a prominent poet of the objectivist school that came to prominence in the 1930s. Brought to the United States by his father in 1910, Rakosi earned a B.A. in 1924 and an M.A. in psychology from the University of Wisconsin in 1926. Though he was already interested in poetry at the time, he studied for a profession that would please his father. During the 1920s and 1930s, he worked a variety of jobs ranging from caseworker for Family Service in Cleveland and instructor at the University of Texas at Austin to social worker in Chicago and supervisor for the Federal Transit Bureau in New Orleans. Meanwhile, he wrote poems in what became known as the objectivist style, an approach to verse that has also been associated with such poets as William Carlos Williams, George Oppen, and Louis Zukofsky. But after publishing Two Poems (1933) and Selected Poems (1941), Rakosi put down his pen to find more gainful employment that could support his family. He earned a degree in social work at the University of Pennsylvania in 1940 and became a case supervisor for the Jewish Social Service Bureau in St. Louis, Missouri. In his professional work, he assumed the name of Callman Rawley, believing that it was more likely that he would be hired if his name did not betray his foreign origins. From 1945 to 1968 he was executive director of the Jewish Family and Children's Service in Minneapolis, and from 1955 to 1971 he also maintained a private practice in psychotherapy. It was while he was thinking about retirement that Rakosi received a letter from a British student who admired his poetry and asked if he had written anything more recently. The missive inspired the poet to return to his verses, resulting in over a dozen new collections, including Amulet (1967), My Experiences in Parnassus (1977), Poems, 1923-1941 (1995), and The Old Poet's Tale (1999). His renewed output gained Rakosi new attention, as well as a number of awards, such as the 1988 Distinguished Service Award from the National Poetry Association. Despite his long hiatus from writing, at his death Rakosi was considered one of the most important American poets of the twentieth century.