Mark Strand, the Pulitzer Prize winning poet, has died at the age of 80. Strand died on Saturday (29th November), his daughter Jessica confirmed.

Jessica Strand, speaking to the L.A. Times, confirmed her father's death. The poet was 80 at the time of his death and died as a result of liposarcoma, a rare form of cancer. Strand was at Jessica's house at the time of his death. 

Jessica paid tribute to her father, describing him as "a funny, elegant, generous and brilliant man. A man who lived to work and to be with his friends and the people he loved."

Strand, is best known for such poems as 'The Dreadful Has Already Happened', 'Breath', 'Coming to This' and 'A Piece of the Storm'.

Strand was born in Canada in 1934 but spent most of his adult life at studying or working at universities in the United States. Strand studied poetry and art at undergraduate level before embarking on a career in literature when he enrolled on the prestigious Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa. 

He spent much of his working life teaching at universities in the U.S. including at Princeton, John Hopkins and Columbia University. During his career he won numerous literary awards including the Pulitzer Prize in 1999 for his collection of poems, Blizzard of One. In 1990, Strand was named the U.S.'s poet Laureate for that year.

Contactmusic send their condolences to Mark Strand's family at this time.