A fiber laser or fiber amplifier uses resonant pumping of the gain medium by providing a pump resonator that establishes a resonator cavity at the pump wavelength which includes the pumped gain medium. The pump resonator may be of a distributed feedback (DFB) or a distributed Bragg reflector (DBR) type construction, and may be combined with signal reflection apparatus of either DFB or DBR type construction that provides oscillation of the desired laser output wavelength. If used without a signal reflection apparatus, the invention may be operated as a resonant pumped fiber amplifier. Resonant pumped lasers may be arranged in series to provide a laser apparatus with a selectable output wavelength. The different laser stages each provide resonance for a different pump wavelength, and each provide resonance for a different signal wavelength. Thus, a particular pump wavelength input to the series arrangement only resonates in one of the laser stages, and therefore only pumps the gain medium of that stage, allowing it to output its unique signal wavelength. The output signals from each laser stage may be coupled out of the series arrangement with wavelength selective optical couplers, each associated with a different laser stage.