A poet and Stanford professor for more than 35 years, Wesley Trimpi was a scholar of English Renaissance lyric poetry and ancient classical literature on campus, at home and abroad. "He felt that the life of the mind was the most important thing," says his daughter Erica Light, '76, and he never ceased to share this vibrant life with the people around him. Trimpi stirred a love for poetry in countless students and wrote influential, innovative books on his decades-long research.
William Wesley Trimpi Jr., '50, of Woodside, died March 6 at Stanford Hospital of pneumonia. He was 85.
Born in New York City, Trimpi studied at Exeter Academy before majoring in English at Stanford. As an undergraduate he published his work in acclaimed journals such as the Paris Review and Poetry, and studied with the legendary poet-critic Yvor Winters. His first poetry collection, The Glass of Perseus, was published in 1953; a second book of poems, The Desert House, was completed in 1982.
After obtaining his doctorate at Harvard, Trimpi returned to Stanford in 1957, where he began his deep investigation of 17th-century lyric poetry, focusing on the work of the English poet Ben Jonson. In his 1962 book, Ben Jonson's Poems: The Study of the Plain Style, Trimpi contended that Jonson's use of the plain style enabled him to explore subject matter that other styles of the time could not—an argument that was considered groundbreaking at the time. Trimpi was an expert on the ancients as well, analyzing the works of Plato, Aristotle and Horace, among other writers and philosophers. His next book, Muses of One Mind: The Literary Analysis of Experience and Continuity, was deemed "a major contribution to our understanding of ancient narrative" by the late Harvard medievalist Morton Bloomfield.
He taught both undergraduate and graduate students until 1992, when he retired as a professor emeritus. At home, Trimpi "was still always the professor," says Erica, who was guided by her father to study the humanities as well. "He always tried to engage us in what he was reading, researching and writing on," she added. He enjoyed hosting dinner parties for other academics and visiting art museums around the country and abroad, often inviting friends or family so they could share in his lasting love for the humanities.
In addition to Erica, Trimpi is survived by his daughter Allison Corcoran; two grandsons; one great-granddaughter; two siblings; and his former spouse, Helen Pinkerton Trimpi, '48, MA '50.
Grace Chao, '14, majored in English and will begin work on her master's degree this fall.
