Michael McGriff is an American

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator (thought, thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral t ...

Life

McGriff was born and raised in

Coos Bay, Oregon Coos Bay () is a city located in Coos County, Oregon, United States, where the Coos River enters Coos Bay on the Pacific Ocean. It shares Coos Bay with the adjacent city of North Bend, Oregon, North Bend. Together, they are often referred to as ...

. His work has appeared in ''Slate'', ''Field'', ''AGNI'', ''The Believer'', ''Missouri Review'', and ''Poetry''. He is the founding editor of Tavern Books, a publishing house dedicated to poetry in translation and the revival of out-of-print books. McGriff's book ''Home Burial'' (

Copper Canyon Press Copper Canyon Press is an independent, non-profit small press, founded in 1972 by Sam Hamill, Tree Swenson, Bill O'Daly, and Jim Gautney, specializing exclusively in the publication of poetry. It is located in Port Townsend, Washington. Copper C ...

, 2012) chronicles the dissolution of a people and their landscape - the coastal Pacific Northwest. His most recent book of poetry, ''Early Hour'', is a book length sequence inspired by German Expressionist

Karl Hofer Karl Christian Ludwig Hofer or ''Carl Hofer'' (11 October 1878 – 3 April 1955) was a German expressionist painter. He was director of the Berlin Academy of Fine Arts. One of the most prominent painters of expressionism, he never was a me ...

's 1935 painting (''Fruhe Stunde'') of the same name. McGriff currently teaches creative writing at the

University of Idaho The University of Idaho (U of I, or UIdaho) is a public land-grant research university in Moscow, Idaho, United States. Established in 1889 and opened three years later, it was the state's sole university for 71 years, until 1963. The un ...

Awards

Stegner Fellowship The Stegner Fellowship program is a two-year creative writing fellowship at Stanford University. The award is named after American Wallace Stegner (1909–1993), a historian, novelist, short story writer, environmentalist, and Stanford faculty m ...

from Stanford University * Ruth Lilly Fellowship from

The Poetry Foundation The Poetry Foundation is a United States literary society that seeks to promote poetry and lyricism in the wider culture. It was formed from ''Poetry'' magazine, which it continues to publish, with a 2003 gift of $200 million from philanthrop ...

* Michener Fellowship from the

University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public university, public research university in Austin, Texas, United States. Founded in 1883, it is the flagship institution of the University of Texas System. With 53,082 stud ...

* 2007

Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize The Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize is a major United States, American literary award for a first full-length book of poetry in the English language. This prize of the University of Pittsburgh Press in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh, Penn ...

, for ''Dismantling the Hills'' * 2010

Lannan Literary Fellowship The Lannan Literary Awards are a series of awards and literary fellowships given out in various fields by the Lannan Foundation. Established in 1989, the awards are meant "to honor both established and emerging writers whose work is of exceptional ...

* 2013 Levis Reading Prize from Virginia Commonwealth University

Works

*"Year of the Rat", ''Courtland Review'', Spring 2009 * * * ''Home Burial'' (

, 2012) * ''Black Postcards'' (Willow Springs Books, 2017) * ''Early Hour'' (Copper Canyon Press, 2017) * ''Eternal Sentences'' (The University of Arkansas Press, 2021) * ''Angel Sharpening Its Beak '' (Carnegie Mellon University Press Poetry Series, 2025)

Anthology

Translation

* "From July ’90", Tomas Tranströmer, ''AGNI 65'', 2007 * "Landscape with Suns", Tomas Tranströmer, ''AGNI 65'', 2007 *

References

External links

"Michael McGriff Q&A recommends two poets", ''Fishouse''
{{DEFAULTSORT:McGriff, Michael Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize winners American male poets Poets from Oregon Stanford University faculty