Categotry Archives: Education

Czeslaw Milosz, a Polish writer, educator and Nobel laureate, died on Aug. 14. Cause of death was not released. He was 93.
Born in Szetejnie (now Lithuania), Milosz studied classical languages and law at the University of Vilnius. He published his first two volumes of poetry while working for the Polish Radio in the 1930s, then watched in horror as the German and Soviet troops invaded his country during World War II. In response, Milosz penned essays for the Resistance in Warsaw.
Fluent in six languages, Milosz served in the diplomatic service of the People’s Poland after the war ended. He became disillusioned with Stalinism, however, and in 1951, sought political asylum in France. After his defection, his published work was banned in Poland, but continued to circulate underground. Milosz was often suicidal during this time period, yet he channeled his pain into several books, including “The Captive Mind,” which discussed the plight of intellectuals under communist rule. He also won the European Literary Prize in 1953 for his novel, “The Seizure of Power.”
Milosz immigrated to the United States in 1960 and taught Slavic languages and literatures at the University of California, Berkeley, for more than 20 years. Although American audiences have had access to English translations of his work since the early 1970s, people in Poland were only allowed to read his books after he won the 1980 Nobel Prize in Literature. Over the next eight years, his words inspired members of the Solidarity trade union movement in Poland to bring down the Soviet-imposed regime.
When the Iron Curtain fell in 1989, Milosz returned to his homeland. Although he’d spent nearly three decades in exile, he was regarded as a freedom fighter and hailed as a hero.
• Listen to a Tribute From NPR

Donald Rodney Justice, a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and educator, died on Aug. 6 of pneumonia. He was 78.
The Miami native earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Miami, a master’s degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a doctorate from the University of Iowa. In 1954, Justice received a Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship in poetry, which he used to visit Europe and write. Upon his return to the states, he spent the next four decades traveling around the country and teaching creative writing classes at several colleges and universities.
In between lectures, Justice penned nearly a dozen poetry collections, including “The Summer Anniversaries” and “Orpheus Hesitated Beside the Black River.” His latest book, “Collected Poems,” will be released this week. Justice’s formalist verse appeared in numerous magazines, such as Poetry, The New Yorker and The Paris Review. He wrote the libretto for Edwin London’s opera, “The Death of Lincoln,” and co-edited “The Collected Poems of Henri Coulette” with Robert Mezey.
In addition to the 1980 Pulitzer Prize for “Selected Poems,” Justice also won the Lamont Award, the Bollingen Prize and the Lannen Literary Award. He served as a chancellor of The Academy of American Poets from 1997 to 2003. A collection of his manuscripts resides at the University of Delaware Library.
• Read Donald Justice’s Poetry

Before Olivia Newton John got “Physical,” before “Buns of Steel” hit video store shelves, before Dr. Atkins’ diet urged millions to give up carbs, Gypsy Boots called on Americans to adopt a healthy lifestyle.
Boots practiced what he preached, too. The California fitness guru and author spent the past six decades advocating clean living, exercise and eating natural foods. Sporting long hair and a thick beard, he shared his views in two books (“Barefeet and Good Things to Eat,” “The Gypsy in Me”) and in numerous appearances on “The Steve Allen Show.”
Born Robert Bootzin, he dropped out of high school and joined a commune of bohemians in the Tahquitz Canyon near Palm Springs. Living off the land, sleeping in caves and bathing in waterfalls, Boots inspired Eden Ahbez to compose the song, “Nature Boy,” which became a hit when Nat King Cole performed it in 1948.
Boots later opened the Health Hut, a grocery store in Los Angeles that served organic foods to health-conscious celebrities. In the 1960s and 1970s, he became a door-to-door salesman, selling organic produce and teaching fitness classes. (His tagline was “Don’t panic, go organic; get in cahoots with Gypsy Boots.”) He also appeared in the films “Mondo Hollywood,” “Swingin’ Summer,” “Confessions of Tom Harris” and “The Game.”
Boots died on Aug. 8. Cause of death was not released, and his exact age was unknown.
• Listen to a Tribute From NPR