Marvin Bell

An American poet and teacher, Marvin Bell was awarded the first Poet Laureate of Iowa and has authored over 20 books of poetry. His work has received various additional honors, including the Lamont Poetry Prize of the Academy of American Poets, Guggenheim and National Endowment for the Arts fellowships, and Senior Fulbright appointments to Yugoslavia and Australia.

He taught for the Iowa Writers’ Workshop for forty years and mentored generations of poets before his retirement in 2005. Throughout his career, he lectured at numerous universities and colleges and gave readings of his poems protesting the Afghanistan and Iraq wars for Poets Against the War. Currently, he is an emeritus faculty member and additionally serves on the faculty of Pacific University’s MFA in Writing program.