Norma Farber

Norma Holzmann Farber (6 August 1909 - 21 March 1984) was an American children's book writer and poet. The Poetry Society of America presents the Norma Farber First Book Award; it is presented for a first book of original poetry written by an American.

Life

She was born in Boston, daughter of G. Augustus and Augusta Schon Holzman. She attended Girls' Latin School.^[1] She earned degrees from Wellesley College, and Radcliffe College.

On 3 July 1928, she married Dr. Sidney Farber, (d. 1973) the founder of the Children's Cancer Research Foundation (now the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute) in Boston. According to her obituary published in the New York Times, she was also a classical soprano.^[2]

Farber authored six books of poems and 18 children's books. Her poetry was first published in the 1940s, and she was still active in writing until her death from vascular disease in 1984.

Awards

• Belgium's Premier Prix in singing.
• Golden Rose Award
• As I Was Crossing Boston Common, was nominated for a National Book Award in 1975.

Works

Poetry

• Look to the Rose: Poems. s.n.. 1958. 
• A Desperate Thing: Marriage is a Desperate Thing. Poems. Plowshare Press. 1973. ISBN 9780873682022. 
• Something Further: Poems. Kylix Press. 1979. ISBN 9780914408109. 
• Shekhina: Forty Poems. Capstone Editions. 1984. ISBN 9780961066222. 
• A Birth in the Family: Nativity Poems. El León Literary Arts. 2003. ISBN 9780887395383. 

Juvenile Poetry

• These Small Stones: Poems. Harper & Row. 1987. ISBN 9780060240134. 
• When it Snowed that Night. HarperCollins. 1993. ISBN 9780060217075. 
• All Those Mothers at the Manger. Harper & Row. 1985. ISBN 9780060218690. 
• Small wonders: poems. Coward, McCann & Geoghegan. 1979. ISBN 9780698204843. 
• Never say ugh to a bug. Greenwillow Books. 1979. ISBN 9780688801403. 
• As I was Crossing Boston Common. E. P. Dutton. 1991. ISBN 9780525259602. 

Juvenile fiction

• Mercy Short: A Winter Journal, North Boston, 1692-93. Dutton,. 1982. ISBN 9780525440147.  first printing 1973
• The Boy who Longed for a Lift. HarperCollins. 1997. ISBN 9780060271084. 

Anthology

• Poets of Today, Norma Farber. "The Hatch, Poems". Robert Pack. "The Irony of Joy, Poems". Louis Simpson. "Good News of Death, and Other Poems". Scribner. 1955. 

References

1. ^ http://www.bookrags.com/biography/norma-farber-dlb/
2. ^ "Norma Farber, 74, Is Dead; Author of Books for Children". The New York Times. March 23, 1984. http://www.nytimes.com/1984/03/23/obituaries/norma-farber-74-is-dead-author-of-books-for-children.html. 

Persondata
Name	Farber, Norma
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	6 August 1909
Place of birth
Date of death	21 March 1984
Place of death