Born in Wisconsin, Stuart Friebert spent an undergraduate year in Germany as one of the first U.S. exchange students after WW II, after which he finished a BA at Wisconsin State College/Milwaukee and took an MA and a PhD at U. Wisconsin/Madison in German Language & Literature. He began teaching at Mt. Holyoke College, then at Harvard, and finally settled at Oberlin College, where he taught German and founded and directed Oberlin's Creative Writing Program until retiring in 1997. Along the way, he co-founded Field Magazine, the Field Translation Series, and Oberlin College Press.
Friebert has published fifteen books of poems (including volumes in German), sixteen volumes of translations, anthologies, and more recently prose (stories, memoir pieces, and critical essays). He has held an N.E.A. Fellowship in poetry and received numerous awards for poems and translations, including the Four Way Book Award for Funeral Pie and the Ohioana Book Award for Floating Heart.
