GUSTAFSON, RALPH BARKER

born Aug. 16, 1909, Lime Ridge, near Sherbrooke, Que., Can. died May 29, 1995, North Hatley, Que. Canadian poet whose work shows a development from traditional form and manner to an elliptical poetry that reflects the influence of Anglo-Saxon verse and the metrical experiments of the 19th-century British poet Gerard Manley Hopkins. Gustafson earned a B.A. in English language and literature from the University of Oxford and then became a tutor and journalist in London. He returned to Canada briefly in 1934 and again in 1938 and then settled in New York after World War II. He later returned again to Canada, teaching at Bishop's University in Lennoxville, Quebec (196379). Gustafson's early volumes of verse, such as The Golden Chalice (1935), Lyrics Unromantic (1942), and Flight into Darkness (1944), showed a gradually increasing individuality of style and an evolving vision. His later works, which are usually considered his better writings, include Rocky Mountain Poems (1960), Rivers Among Rocks (1960), Sift in an Hourglass (1966), Ixion's Wheel (1969), Conflicts of Spring (1981), Plummets and Other Partialities and Winter Prophesies (both 1987), and Shadows in the Grass (1991). Gustafson also produced two volumes of short stories, The Brazen Tower (1974) and The Vivid Air (1980).