Harold Schweizer

Harold Schweizer is a Swiss/American literary scholar and poet who served as Professor of English at Bucknell University in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania. His work focuses on literary theory, poetry, and philosophical aspects of literature, including themes such as suffering, memory, and waiting. He taught at Bucknell University from 1987 until his retirement in 2019.

Early life and education

Schweizer studied at the University of Zurich, where he received a Licentiatus Philosophiae (lic. phil. I) in English with minors in German and Swedish in 1980. He later earned a PhD (Dr. phil.) from the same university in 1983, graduating magna cum laude.

Following his doctoral studies, he held teaching positions at the University of Zurich and later received an American Council of Learned Societies postdoctoral fellowship. During this period he conducted research at State University of New York at Buffalo and Yale University.

Academic career

Schweizer joined the faculty of Bucknell University in 1987 as an assistant professor of English. From 1987 until 1992, he directed a faculty development seminar, The Mellon Seminars in Literary Theory, and co-edited with the late Michael Payne twelve volumes in The Bucknell Lectures in Literary Theory published with Basil Blackwell. From 2006 to 2011 he held the title of John P. Crozer Professor of English Literature.

Writing and scholarship

Schweizer’s academic work examines literature in relation to philosophical and ethical questions. His research has addressed topics such as human temporality, aesthetics, trauma in literature, illness narratives, and representations of suffering.

His book On Waiting (2088) discusses the cultural and philosophical meanings of waiting in literature. His articles have appeared in journals including Journal of Modern Literature, Literature and Medicine, and American Poetry Review including studies of writers such as Raymond Carver, Tess Gallagher, Elizabeth Bishop, Rainer Maria Rilke, G.C. Waldrep, Virginia Woolf, Marcel Proust, W.G. Sebald.

Poetry

In addition to his academic work, Schweizer has published poetry in literary journals such as The Kenyon Review, The Georgia Review, The American Poetry Review, Narrative, and The Missouri Review. His poems have also appeared in Poetry International, Pleiades, and The Cincinnati Review.

Selected books

Non-fiction

• Suffering and the Remedy of Art (1997)
• On Waiting (2008)
• Rarity and the Poetic: The Gesture of Small Flowers (2016)
• On Lingering and Literature (2021)
• Rilke’s Hands: An Essay on Gentleness (2023)

Poetry

• The Book of Stones and Angels (2015)
• Miriam’s Book: A Poem (2017)
• The Genealogy of Elevators (2018)

Edited works

• History and Memory: Suffering and Art (1998)
• The Patient (2010, with Kimberly Myers)
• The Poetry of Irving Feldman (1992)
• The Bucknell Lectures in Literary Theory (1988-1994)

Awards and honors

Schweizer received several awards during his career at Bucknell University, including the Presidential Award for Teaching Excellence and the Class of 2000 Award for Teaching. He also held the NEH Chair in the Humanities from 1993 to 1996 and received multiple Bucknell University research grants.

References

This article "Harold Schweizer" is from Simple English Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Harold Schweizer.

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