Katheryn Starbuck was born in 1939 n Algona, Iowa. She is a former political journalist and essayist and for many years was the editor of The Milford (NH)
Cabinet newspaper. She is the editor, with Elizabeth Meese, of two books of poems by the late George Starbuck:
Visible Ink (2002, University of Alabama Press) and
The Works: Poems Selected from Five Decades (2003, University of Alabama Press). She lives in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.
"Griefmania" is a translation of Kathryn Starbuck's maiden name from the Greek and Turkish. The meaning of her name is the subject of her poetry; this book also provides us with an exquisite, brief prose memoir. Starbuck's art portrays the madness of intense grief. Griefmania is a first book, written by the poet in her sixties. Further, when she looks at herself (unlike Narcissus, unlike most poets) she almost falls in love with history--that is, the grief of others. Mysteriously, the reader will find, perhaps unknown to the poet, the book is also haunted by the good ghost of joy. This is a profoundly beautiful book which, in manuscript, was much appreciated by Anthony Hecht.
