James Laughlin

James Laughlin – Life, Career, and Selected Passages

James Laughlin (1914–1997) was an American poet and visionary publisher. As founder of New Directions, he shaped 20th-century modernism in the U.S., while also producing a modest but distinctive poetic corpus. Read his biography, major works, role in publishing, and memorable lines.

Introduction

James Laughlin occupies a unique position in American letters: part practitioner, part patron, wholly builder. Though his own poetry never enjoyed the spotlight that some of his authors did, his role as publisher—especially through the founding and stewardship of New Directions—proved monumental. His life reflects tensions of wealth and literary commitment, silence and publication, the quiet craft of verse and the bold leap of discovering new voices. Today his name lives not only in his own work, but in the many writers he championed and the award that bears his name.

Early Life and Family

James Laughlin was born October 30, 1914, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to Henry Hughart Laughlin and Marjory Rea Laughlin. His family was embedded in the steel industry: the Laughlins were major figures in the Jones & Laughlin Steel Company, a family fortune that would later fund his literary ventures.

Though he grew up amid industrial wealth, Laughlin rejected the idea of entering the steel business. As he once admitted, visiting the mills as a child convinced him that he did “not belong in that world.”

His boyhood home in Pittsburgh is now part of the campus of what is Chatham University.

He was educated at Choate School (Choate Rosemary Hall) in Connecticut, where a formative teacher was Dudley Fitts, a translator and literary mentor.

Education and European Encounters

Laughlin matriculated at Harvard University in 1933, majoring in Latin and Italian. But Laughlin soon found Harvard’s literary conservatism stifling—his professors reportedly would leave the room when Ezra Pound or T. S. Eliot were mentioned.

In his sophomore year, Laughlin took a leave of absence to travel in Europe. In France and later in Rapallo, Italy, he met Gertrude Stein and Ezra Pound. Pound tutored Laughlin privately in his so-called “Ezuversity,” but eventually counseled him to turn from poetry toward publishing.

Returning to Harvard, Laughlin used money from his father (and a graduation gift) to fund a literary venture.

Founding New Directions & Publishing Vision

In 1936, at age 22, Laughlin founded New Directions Publishing. He began the press from a cottage (later a barn) in Norfolk, Connecticut, with a modest endowment from his family.

The first publication was the anthology New Directions in Prose & Poetry, which included contributions from Elizabeth Bishop, E. E. Cummings, Marianne Moore, Wallace Stevens, William Carlos Williams—and Laughlin himself (under the pseudonym Tasilo Ribischka).

Laughlin’s goal for New Directions was to provide space for experimental, avant-garde, and under-recognized writing. Over time, the press published works by Ezra Pound, William Carlos Williams, Tennessee Williams, Henry Miller, Vladimir Nabokov, and many others. He also invested in translations of international literature, bringing European, Latin American, and Asian voices to the American audience.

Despite publishing many books that did not sell well, Laughlin kept New Directions afloat, in part by subsidizing with commercial successes (for example, the popularity of Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse) and by drawing on his own financial backing.

New Directions is known for its integrity: the staff may vote on what to publish, but Laughlin retained final say, sometimes featuring a “Proprietor’s List” for daring works he believed in even if the staff balked.

Laughlin’s vision helped modernist literature become more firmly rooted in the American literary ecosystem and brought transnational modernism into conversation with American writers.

Literary Work: Poetry and Prose

Although often overshadowed by his role as publisher, Laughlin remained a poet throughout his life, publishing intermittently across decades.

His first full book was Some Natural Things, published in 1945.

Over time, Laughlin produced about 20 books of poetry, short stories, essays, and memoirs.

Notable poetic works include:

• The River

• In Another Country

• Collected Poems of James Laughlin (1992)

• The House of Light, Tabellae, The Owl of Minerva, The Bird of Endless Time, The Country Road, The Secret Room, A Commonplace Book of Pentastichs

He also wrote prose, critical essays, memoirs, and edited volumes such as Random Essays: Recollections of a Publisher and The Way It Wasn’t: From the Files of James Laughlin.

Laughlin once modestly described his writing as “very light … sentimental … dealing with no great subjects, no great thoughts.”

His poetry tends toward the plainspoken, attentive to particulars of daily life, memory, and interior reflection—less spectacle than interior observation.

Among his better-known poems is “Step on His Head,” often anthologized, which reflects on his relationship with his children.

Personal Life, Struggles & Later Years

Laughlin was married three times. First to Margaret Keyser, with whom he had two children; then in 1955 to Anne Clark Resor (another two children); and finally in 1990 to Gertrude Huston, who had served as New Directions’ art director and designer.

His son Robert suffered from depression and died by suicide in 1986. Laughlin memorialized some of this grief in a poem, Experience of Blood.

Laughlin was also an avid outdoorsman. He loved skiing and hiking; he helped found the Alta Ski Area in Utah and was part owner there.

Despite his publishing responsibilities, Laughlin continued writing, editing, corresponding, and overseeing New Directions until the end of his life.

On November 12, 1997, he died of complications from a stroke in Norfolk, Connecticut, at age 83.

Legacy & Influence

Laughlin’s impact in American letters is multifaceted:

• Publisher par excellence: Many consider his greatest legacy to be not his own writing, but the books he made possible—voices like Pound, Williams, Nabokov, and many more found a home at New Directions.

• Modernism in America: His press helped cement a transatlantic modernist tradition within American literature and connect U.S. writers to international innovations.

• Endowment to poetry: The James Laughlin Award, established by the Academy of American Poets in 1954 (endowed further in 1995), supports a poet’s second published book, encouraging continuity in poetic careers.

• Commitment to independence: Laughlin labored to maintain editorial independence, resisting commercial pressures in favor of art and risk.

• Model of dual vocation: As a poet-publisher, Laughlin exemplified how one might both nurture others and continue one’s own creative life, even when the latter remains in the shadows.

Though his poetry never gained mass readership, it commands respect in literary circles for its modesty, intelligence, and quiet depths.

Selected Lines & Quotations

Though less quotable than some contemporaries, here are a few lines and reflections from Laughlin:

(From his self-description) “It’s very light; it’s sentimental; it deals with no great subjects, no great thoughts.”

While not many of his lines circulate widely as epigraphs, Step on His Head remains among the poems frequently excerpted, especially for those interested in his domestic and relational themes.

Moreover, those who read his correspondence and essays find recurring notes of humility, stewardship, and subtle literary judgment, threading through his life as publisher and writer.

Lessons from James Laughlin

1. Service as art
   Laughlin teaches that enabling others’ creativity—publishing, championing, sustaining—is an artistic act in its own right.

2. Quiet perseverance
   He managed to combine longevity, consistency, and integrity in a field often driven by fads and aggression.

3. Balance insider and outsider roles
   Born into wealth but rejecting its direct line, he occupied both establishment and avant-garde positions simultaneously.

4. Sustain voice without shouting
   His poetry doesn’t seek volume; it invites careful attention. That is a reminder that creative voice need not always compete for intensity.

5. Legacy in institutions
   Laughlin’s life shows that one’s influence may endure through structures—like a publishing house or an award—even beyond one’s works.

Conclusion

James Laughlin may not be among the first names cited when discussing 20th-century American poets, but his mark on the literary field is profound. He created infrastructure, mentored voices, broadened horizons, and quietly wrote poetry of particular attentiveness. His dual life as poet and publisher reminds us that the ecosystem of literature depends not only on the voices that speak, but on those who listen, trust, and provide space.