Born on the Lower East Side in 1904 to immigrant Russian Jewish parents, Louis Zukofsky spent his entire life in New York City, reading and writing and doing as little else as possible. He was abstemious, hypochondriac, a chain-smoker; he cared little for food, took almost no exercise and insisted that the windows of his apartment be shut tight at all times: he was very susceptible to draughts. At 35 he married a Jewish pianist and composer called Celia Thaew, whom he had met six years before while supervising a Work Projects Administration programme. She had had a copy of William Carlos Williams's In the American Grain at the corner of her desk, which she had bought so she'd have something to read on the long subway ride to and from work. The couple had a son, Paul, in 1943, a musical prodigy and now a well-known violinist and conductor.

LRB 22 May 2008 | PDF Download