Renner, Bruce John

Dodgeville - Bruce John Renner, 81, passed away on Thursday, October 30, 2025, in the farmhouse in Dodgeville where he lived for 40 years.

He was born on October 8, 1944, in Inglewood California, the son of Stanley and Catherine (Kay) Renner. He and Livija Dunis married in 1983. Bruce held a B.A. (UW-Milwaukee) and an M.F.A. (Columbia University) in Creative Writing. Throughout his entire life Bruce was a poet and writer.

Over the years, he taught at The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Marquette University, and the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design. His writing was published widely in periodicals, and he published three books of poetry with L’Epervier Press: Wakefulness, Song Made out of a Pale Smoke, and The Language of Light Ambits. After moving out to their farmhouse in southwestern Wisconsin, his writing was strongly influenced by both the landscape and the people who lived nearby.

Bruce is survived by his wife Livija; his twin sister Joyce; his daughter Ona, her children Sophie and Maeve, as well as Livija’s children Eriks and Anna and granddaughter Deva. 

No services will be held.

“You sing and you sing, you talk and you talk, / still, you slip through time…”

--“Excerpt from a Prelude to Hope,” adapted from Vicente Huidobro by Bruce Renner

Gorgen-McGinley & Ayers 

Funeral Home

www.gorgenfh.com