Meet Elizabeth Socolow, prize winning poet and one of BHC’s Zoom members.
A BHC Member Profile by Annie Hoyer
Elizabeth was born in the Bronx in 1940. Her father was a physician, her mother a medical social worker. During her childhood, she took on atypical responsibilities. Her sister Vicky, who was 3 years younger, was born with a brain issue that was ultimately deemed to be schizophrenia but went undiagnosed till her teens. She was slow to learn, though her intelligence was measurably excellent, and given to acting out in seemingly inexplicable ways. Elizabeth’s father was busy with his practice and her mother seemed unable to accept Vicky’s situation.
Poets are observers, and though Elizabeth was years away from practicing the craft, she innately possessed this ability. She watched Vicky carefully, and gradually learned what triggered her outbursts and what calmed her. For instance, Elizabeth saw that music soothed her sister, so she taught her songs.
In elementary school, Elizabeth offered suggestions to Vicky’s teachers on how to handle her. At first, her advice fell on deaf ears. But soon, desperate teachers began to ask for Elizabeth’s input. During her penultimate year of elementary school, the principal called Elizabeth to her office. “Your parents don’t answer when we phone,” the principal told her, “and you won’t be here when your sister is in her last years.” She continued that it was clear from Elizabeth’s straight As she didn’t need Friday afternoon study hall, so instead, would Elizabeth meet with her? “I’ll gather questions from Vicky’s teachers. Then I’ll relay your advice back to them.” An unusual request of a 11-year-old child!
Shining academically helped Elizabeth through her uncommon childhood. She graduated from Vassar in 1962 and went straight to Harvard for a PhD in English. For women, the atmosphere was not conducive to advancement. She was one of 15 females out of a total of 200 graduate students. At the end of the 1st year, all but 5 women had left. Elizabeth was one of the survivors. Though she’d already decided she wanted to be a poet, she believed it would help her career to have solid academic credentials.
At the same time she started at Harvard, Elizabeth married a man who was also making his way through a doctorate. The couple had two boys and were together for 20 years. Elizabeth remains closely connected to her sons and her three grandchildren.
During the marriage, the family moved as Elizabeth’s husband pursued an academic career. Ultimately, they settled in Princeton, where he taught at the university. Elizabeth found interesting work with the State of New Jersey’s Council on the Arts. She trained teachers how to actively involve students in poetry by teaching them to observe the world like a poet and to write poetry.
She also worked on her own poetry. She tapped into her knowledge of the 16th and 17th centuries to explore the work of Isaac Newton. This interest evolved into a book of poems entitled Laughing at Gravity: Conversations with Isaac Newton. In 1987, she won the Barnard Women Poets Prize based on this book. She went on to publish 10 other books of poetry. She continues to enjoy overseeing the growth of several of her poet friends.
The Dead Poets Society, a popular movie in 1989, was filmed at St. Andrews, a private school in Delaware. Thus inspired, the school decided to have a Poet in Residence, and Elizabeth enjoyed filling this position. The job became a springboard for her to work at another elite private school in Detroit. This position ended unhappily. Her second year there, someone painted a swastika on her classroom door. She insisted the headmaster address this antisemitic act during assembly. When he didn’t, she left the school.
After that, she taught for almost a decade at several colleges in the Detroit area.
Elizabeth’s father was fervently Jewish. She attended Hebrew school, though she didn’t have a bat mitzvah. “I’ve always loved the learning part of Judaism, the Torah study, the questioning,” she reflected. Early in her adulthood, she met Mordecai Kaplan, founder of the Reconstructionist movement. “His desire to include women, to bring Jewish traditions into the modern world – he was an inspirational presence.”
Since that time, wherever she’s lived, Elizabeth has sought out a Reconstructionist rabbi. In Detroit, she met an interning rabbi named Donna Kirschbaum. She’s followed our R. Kirschbaum’s career ever since.
Today Elizabeth lives in a retirement community in New Jersey. Although nearly 20 years ago she triumphed over ovarian cancer, it required two major surgeries, and the treatment left her with deficits. In 2015, she had open heart surgery. Her eyesight prohibits driving and all but claims her ability to read. “I never thought living here would be the last chapter of my life,” she remarked, “but recently, I realized I’m okay with it, even happy.”
Elizabeth feels fulfilled by her children, grandchildren and her body of work. She’s had tough, dispiriting times in her life, but she looks back, recognizes she survived them, and considers this is an accomplishment, as surely as her degrees or her poetry are.
Proflle by Annie Hoyer