MERRILL, JAMES

born March 3, 1926, New York, N.Y., U.S. died Feb. 6, 1995, Tucson, Ariz. in full James Ingram Merrill American poet especially known for the fine craftsmanship and wit of his lyric and epic poems. Merrill was the son of Charles E. Merrill, a founder of Merrill Lynch, an investment-banking firm. He attended private schools and Amherst College (B.A., 1947), and inherited wealth enabled him to devote his life to his poetry. His first book, First Poems (1951), and subsequent collections revealed his formal mastery but were somewhat impersonal and artificial in tone. With Water Street (1962), critics noted a growing ease and the development of a personal vision in his writing. With Nights and Days (1966), The Fire Screen (1969), and Braving the Elements (1972), Merrill gained wider public appreciation. His verse in these books was more autobiographical and tended to focus on poignant moments in his romantic and domestic life. He skillfully combined lyric language with ordinary conversation and possessed a voice that could be witty, intimate, and colloquial while retaining a high degree of formal elegance. The publication of the epic poetry in Divine Comedies (1976), Mirabell: Books of Number (1978), and Scripts for the Pageant (1980)a trilogy later published in The Changing Light at Sandover (1982)established Merrill as one of the leading American poets of his generation. This 17,000-line work presents a series of conversations held with various real and fictional persons in the spirit world by means of a Ouija board, a device that enabled Merrill to compose a serious yet witty summation of his lifelong concerns. A selection of his poetry, From the First Nine: Poems 19461976, was published in 1982. Merrill also wrote plays, novels, essays, and the memoir A Different Person (1993). His 15th and last book of poetry, A Scattering of Salts, appeared posthumously in 1995.