Frank Stanford
Frank Stanford was an American poet born on August 1, 1948, in Mississippi, who is celebrated for his significant contributions to literature despite his brief life. Adopted at a young age and raised in the Ozarks and Memphis, he pursued civil engineering at the University of Arkansas while actively engaging in the literary community. Stanford's poetry reflects the influence of iconic poets such as Walt Whitman and William Blake. His most notable work, "The Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You," is a monumental 542-page poem published in 1977, which has garnered critical acclaim for its depth and complexity. Throughout the early 1970s, he founded Lost Roads Press, promoting his and others' literary works. Tragically, Stanford's life ended in suicide at the age of twenty-nine, yet his literary legacy continues to resonate. His poetry remains influential, with several reissues drawing renewed interest and respect, ensuring that Stanford's voice endures within American literature.
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Subject Terms
Frank Stanford
Author
- Born: August 1, 1948
- Birthplace: Mississippi
- Died: June 3, 1978
Biography
Frank Stanford was born on August 1, 1948, in Mississipi, and was adopted by Dorothy Gilbert in 1949. When Gilbert married in 1952, her husband A. F. Stanford adopted young Frank. Stanford grew up in the Ozarks and in Memphis. After his father’s death in 1963, Stanford entered the Benedictine Academy and Monastery in Subiaco, Arkansas, enrolling at the University of Arkansas in 1967. Stanford studied civil engineering while at the university, although he was very active in the literary community. His civil engineering training, however, supported him for the rest of his short life as he made his living as a land surveyor.
As an undergraduate, his talent was obvious; his work was published in journals such as the American Poetry Review. Stanford understood himself as a poet in the tradition of Walt Whitman and William Blake. He also was a student at the University of Arkansas’s master of fine arts program, and placed poetry in national magazines and anthologies. His first collection, The Singing Knives, was published in 1971, when he was just twenty-three years old. His book The Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You is generally considered to be his most impressive work. At 542 pages and some twenty-three thousand lines, the single poem of the volume is extraordinary. The book was published in 1977.
In the early 1970’s, publisher Irving Broughton made a film about Stanford’s work and his life. The film, titled It Wasn’t a Dream, It Was a Flood, won the West Coast Film Festivals Experimental Film Award in 1975. Also during the 1970’s, Stanford applied to the National Endowment for the Arts for funding to start his own publishing house, Lost Roads Press. Against all odds, he won the funding and started the publishing house under his own terms.
In all, Stanford published seven volumes of poetry before he killed himself with a gunshot wound to the head when he was twenty-nine, in June, 1978. In spite of his death, and in spite of most of his books being out of print for over a decade, Stanford continues to garner critical and popular attention. Poets such as Bruce Weigl, Thomas Lux, and Frank Dickey have written powerful elegies to the young man. In 1991 Conditions Uncertain and Likely to Pass Away and The Light the Dead See were reissued. In 2002, Stanford’s masterpiece The Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You was also reissued, receiving universal acclamation from critics and fans. While Stanford’s life as a poet was short, his influence seems to be growing. It is likely that his work will continue to be republished and studied as an example of powerful American work.