James Dickey

James Lafayette Dickey (February 2, 1923 – January 19, 1997) was an American poet and novelist. From 1966 to 1968 he was the eighteenth United States Poet Laureate.
Dickey was born in Buckhead, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta. He read Lord Byron's poetry when he was young. In high school he was good at football. He played varsity at Clemson College in South Carolina. World War II caused him to leave Clemson in 1942. He joined the U. S. Air Force and fought in the Asian and Pacific area. He started writing poetry during this time.
After the war, he finished his college work by getting a masters degree at Vanderbilt University. He taught for a while, but got a job writing advertisements to make more money.
In 1966, his poetry book "Buckdancer's Choice" won the National Book Award. Three of his other books were finalists: "Helmets" (1965), "Deliverance" (1971), and "Sorties" (1972). "Deliverance" was a novel that later was made into a movie.
He read a poem, "The Strength of Fields," at President Carter's inauguration in 1977. He was also a judge from 1990 to 1996 of the Yale Younger Poets Series.