Some of the materials in the collection are photocopies from the
Richard Hugo was born December 21, 1923 in Seattle and was raised in White Center, a working class district of Seattle. Hugo lived with his grandparents for most of his childhood and early adult life. He served as a bombardier in Italy during World War II. Following the war, Hugo attended the University of Washington, where he studied writing with Theodore Roethke. He earned a BA in 1948 and a MA in 1952. In 1959 Hugo, along with Carolyn Kizer, Earl Pritchard and Nelson Bentley, founded the literary magazine
While continuing to write poetry, Hugo supported himself for 13 years by working for the Boeing Aircraft Company in various jobs, including that of a technical writer. In 1963 he left Boeing to revisit Italy. He returned to the United States in 1964 to accept a teaching position at the University of Montana, where he became Director of the Creative Writing Program in 1971, and where he continued to teach until his death.
During the last two decades of his life, Hugo's reputation as a writer grew with the publication of nine collections of poetry, three chapbooks, a collection of essays and a detective novel. He was twice nominated for the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. In 1968, the Rockefeller Foundation awarded him a traveling grant which allowed him to revisit Italy. In 1976 he was appointed editor of the Yale Younger Poets Series. In 1977 Hugo received a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, which allowed him to live in Scotland from 1977-1978. At various times he was a guest lecturer at the University of Iowa, University of Arkansas, University of Colorado, and University of Washington. Hugo survived the loss of a lung to cancer in 1980, but died of leukemia in Seattle on October 22, 1982.
Posthumous publications of Hugo's work include a chapbook,
The collection includes copies of correspondence between Hugo and Stafford, typed drafts and copies of some of Hugo's books, publications featuring Hugo, and a research paper on the relationship between Hugo and William Stafford.
Arranged in a single series of items grouped by material type and date.
This collection has no restrictions and is open for research.
Permission to publish, exhibit, broadcast, or quote from materials in the Watzek Library Archives & Special Collections requires written permission of the Head of Archives & Special Collections.
The Richard Hugo Collection (OLPb140HUG), Lewis & Clark College Aubrey Watzek Library Archives & Special Collections, Portland, Oregon.
Assembled by Lewis & Clark College Special Collections staff from materials originally owned by William Stafford and from copies of materials in the Richard Hugo Papers at the University of Washington.
Processed in 2013.
The William Stafford Archives at Lewis & Clark College also includes photographs of Richard Hugo taken by Stafford.
This collection is indexed under the following headings in the online catalog. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons, or places should search the catalog using these headings.
The following section contains a detailed listing of the materials in the collection.
Letters are photocopies from the William Stafford Archives at Lewis & Clark College and the Hugo Papers at University of Washington.
photocopy of typed manuscript from William Stafford's library.
Original typed manuscript from William Stafford's library.
Mimeographed typed manuscript from William Stafford's library.
Includes an interview with Richard Hugo.
A research paper and materials for an exhibit on Hugo and Stafford.