Ed Ochester

Edwin Frank Ochester (September 15, 1939 – August 22, 2023) was an American poet and editor. He was born in Brooklyn, New York, and educated at Cornell, Harvard, and the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

For nearly twenty years, Ochester served as director of the writing program at the University of Pittsburgh, and he was twice elected president of the Association of Writers & Writing Programs. From 1967 to 1970, he was assistant professor of English at the University of Florida, Gainesville.

Since 1979, he served as general editor of the Pitt Poetry Series, one of the largest lists of contemporary American poetry, published by the University of Pittsburgh Press. Ochester was also general editor of the Drue Heinz Literature Prize for short fiction.

Poets published by Ochester in the Pitt Series include Sharon Olds, Billy Collins, Ted Kooser, Lawrence Joseph, Richard Shelton, Larry Levis, Denise Duhamel, Lynn Emanuel, Bob Hicok, Jim Daniels, Gary Soto, Stuart Dybek, Kathleen Norris, Alicia Ostriker, Toi Derricotte, Dean Young, and David Wojahn.

His book ''Dancing on the Edges of Knives'' won the 1973 Devins Award for Poetry, and he has won fellowships in poetry from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts.

He died in August 2023, at the age of 83. Provided by Wikipedia