George Bogin (1920-1988) was an American poet and translator. A lifelong New Yorker; he was raised in Queens and graduated from Columbia College in 1939. He served in World War II, and ultimately settled in Great Neck, where he remained for the rest of his life. He was a passionate supporter of human rights and civil liberties, and was a founder of the Great Neck Peace Forum in the early 1950s. He was widely published in literary magazines and anthologies, including The Paris Review, The American Poetry Review, The Nation, Chicago Review, Columbia Forum, New Letters, Massachusetts Review, Kansas Quarterly, and Ploughshares. He also held residencies at MacDowell, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Tyrone Guthrie Center in Annaghmekerrig, Ireland. One of Bogin's poems “Pitchipoi” was set to music for orchestra and soloists by Lloyd Ultan in Pitchipoi (The Children of Drancy) (1983). His translation work was primarily from the French, and included Bosquet and Supervielle. He published two books, a translation of Jules Supervielle's works Selected Poems and Reflections on the Art of Poetry (1985), and his own book of poetry In a Surf of Strangers (1981). After his death, Bogin's friends and family established the George Bogin Memorial Award. This is awarded for “a selection of four or five poems that reflects the encounter of the ordinary and the extraordinary, uses language in an original way, and takes a stand against oppression in all its forms.”
George Bogin
Studios
Phi Beta
George Bogin worked in the Phi Beta studio.
Funded by the Phi Beta Fraternity, a national professional fraternity of music and speech founded in 1912, Phi Beta Studio was built between 1929–1931 of granite quarried on the MacDowell grounds. The small studio is a simple in design, but displays a pleasing combination of materials with its granite walls and colorful slate roofing. Inside is…