Jean Valentine (born 1934) is an American poet, and currently the New York State Poet (2008—2010). Her poetry collection, Door in the Mountain: New and Collected Poems, 1965-2003, was awarded the 2004 National Book Award for Poetry.
Her most recent book is Little Boat (Wesleyan University Press 2007). Her first book, Dream Barker, won the Yale Series of Younger Poets competition in 1965. She has published poems widely in literary journals and magazines, including The New Yorker, and Harper's Magazine, and The American Poetry Review. Valentine was one of five poets including Charles Wright, Russell Edson, James Tate and Louise Gluck, whose work Lee Upton considered critically in The Muse of Abandonment: Origin, Identity, Mastery in Five American Poets (Bucknell University Press, 1998). She has held residencies from Yaddo, MacDowell Colony, UCross, and the Lannan foundation, among others.
She was born in Chicago, received bachelor of arts and a master of arts degrees at Radcliffe College, and has lived most of her life in New York City. She has taught with the Graduate Writing Program at New York University, at Columbia University, at the 92nd Street Y in Manhattan, and at Sarah Lawrence College. She is a faculty member at Vermont College of Fine Arts. She was married to the late American historian James Chace from 1957 - 1968, and they have two daughters, Sarah and Rebecca.
The New York Times > A Poet in Yonkers > by Hershenson, Roberta > Nov. 28, 2004, section 14WC, p. 13
Academy of American Poets > Jean Valentine
Publishers Weekly Review of Door in the Mountain by Reed Business Information (Accessed via the Seattle Public Library and Syndetic Solutions, Inc.)
Weiner, Tim. "James Chace, Foreign Policy Thinker, Is Dead at 72". The New York Times (Late East Coast edition), October 11, 2004, p. B.7. (Accessed via ProQuest, Document ID 710384891)