Ripening

by Richard Hague

Hague, Richard

Hardcover

Published January 1, 1984

About the author

Richard Hague (born 1947) is an American poet and writer.

Born August 7, he was raised in Steubenville, Ohio, in Appalachian Ohio's Steel Valley, where he worked summers for Wheeling Steel and the Penn Central Railroad. He studied as a high school student at Northwestern University's Summer High School Journalism Institute and as an adult in Oxford, England on a six-week NEH Seminar. His BS and MA degrees in English are from Xavier University in Cincinnati. He continues to teach writing to adults and young people in Cincinnati. He is former Chair of the English Department at Purcell Marian High School where the Writing Program he designed and administered won the National First Prize in The English-Speaking Union “Excellence in English Award” in 1994.

Reviews

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bias alert -- Dick (back then I called him Mr. Hague, well sometimes I still do!) was one of the first people I knew who had published a book, and this was the first book of his I read. I remember talking about it with other high school friends, how scary the woman in "Katydid" was, how earthy and so like him the rest of it was.

My copy had a green and yellow jacket, and he signed the inside. I don't have that particular copy anymore, but I almost don't need to -- it is seared into my memory, the colors and the poems and the handwriting. Decades later, Dick has many more collections available, but for me this one is definitive.