verse and sang silly songs. She majored first in
philosophy and then in English literature at
Occidental College in California, graduating
with a bachelor’s degree in 1959.
Fraser’s path to becoming a poet was not easy.
She was discouraged early on by grade-school
teachers who presented a limited, traditional view-
point on writing and readingverse.Incollege,she
discovered the works of Walt Whitman, E. E.
Cummings, and William Carlos Williams and
began to write her own poetry. After graduation,
FrasermovedtoNewYorkCity,whereshe
worked atMademoisellemagazine and took poetry
writing classes with Stanley Kunitz and Kenneth
Koch. Fraser met her first husband, Jack Mitchell,
in one of these classes; they married in 1960. The
next decade was crucial for Fraser’s emerging
poetic voice. She struggled to cast off the oppres-
sive hand of her formal education, a battle she was
aided in by friends and teachers such as Kenneth
Koch, Barbara Guest, and Frank O’Hara.
Change of Address, Fraser’s first book of
poetry, was published in 1966; her son David
was born later that year. Fraser and Mitchell
abruptly moved across the country to San Fran-
cisco in 1967 after their apartment in New York
City was burgled. The couple divorced in 1970,
and in a short time, after teaching at the Iowa
Writers’ Workshop (1969–1971) and as writer-
in-residence at Reed College in Portland, Ore-
gon (1971–1972), Fraser found that her calling lay
in education. She subsequently became Director
of The Poetry Center (1972–1976) at San Fran-
cisco State University, where she continued to
teach as a Professor of Creative Writing in the
MFA graduate program until 1992.
During these years, Fraser was the recipient
of numerous awards. She received both the
Discovery Award from the YMHA Poetry Cen-
ter, NYC, and the Frank O‘Hara Poetry Award
(for innovation in poetry) from The New School,
NYC, in 1964. She received the ‘‘Young Writers
Discovery Award’’ from the National Endow-
ment for the Arts (1971–1972) and was awarded
a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship
(1978). A few years later, she was awarded the
Guggenheim Fellowship in Poetry (1980–1981).
What I Wantwas published in 1974 and
collects much of Fraser’s previously publishedKathleen Fraser(Photograph by A. K. Bierman)
Poem in Which My Legs Are Accepted