Sam Witt (born 1970) is an American poet and

tenured Tenure is a type of academic appointment that protects its holder from being fired or laid off except for cause, or under extraordinary circumstances such as financial exigency or program discontinuation. Academic tenure originated in the United ...

English professor who currently lives in

Brookline, Massachusetts Brookline () is an affluent town in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States, and part of the Greater Boston, Boston metropolitan area. An exclave of Norfolk County, Brookline borders six of Boston's neighborhoods: Brighton, Boston, Brighton ...

Life

Witt was born in Wimbledon, England in 1970. He studied as an

undergraduate Undergraduate education is education conducted after secondary education and before postgraduate education, usually in a college or university. It typically includes all postsecondary programs up to the level of a bachelor's degree. For example, ...

at the

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia, United States. It was founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson and contains his The Lawn, Academical Village, a World H ...

and went on to receive his MFA from the

Iowa Writers' Workshop The Iowa Writers' Workshop, at the University of Iowa, is a graduate-level creative writing program. At 89 years, it is the oldest writing program offering a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) degree in the United States. Its acceptance rate is between 2 ...

. ''Everlasting Quail'' was published in 2010 by the University Press of New England. Witt went on to spend a year in

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

as a

Fulbright Scholar The Fulbright Program, including the Fulbright–Hays Program, is one of several United States cultural exchange programs with the goal of improving intercultural relations, cultural diplomacy, and intercultural competence between the peopl ...

to work on his second book. Witt has taught at the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Iowa, the

New England Institute of Art The New England Institute of Art (NEiA) was a private for-profit art school in Brookline, Massachusetts. The school was founded in 1952 as the Norm Prescott School of Broadcasting and was one of the 45 Art Institutes in North America. The schoo ...

, Saint Petersburg State University, the University of Missouri at Kansas City, and as a creative writing

lecturer Lecturer is an academic rank within many universities, though the meaning of the term varies somewhat from country to country. It generally denotes an academic expert who is hired to teach on a full- or part-time basis. They may also conduct re ...

in the

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Culture, language and peoples * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England * ''English'', an Amish ter ...

Department of

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

. He was a member of the faculty at

Whitman College Whitman College is a private liberal arts college in Walla Walla, Washington. The school offers 53 majors and 33 minors in the liberal arts and sciences, and it has a student-to-faculty ratio of 9:1. Founded as a seminary by a territorial l ...

. He is now a tenured member of the English faculty at

Framingham State University Framingham State University (Framingham State or FSU) is a public university in Framingham, Massachusetts. The university, then known as the Normal School in Lexington was founded in 1839 as the first state-supported normal school in the United ...

and served as Jaded Ibis Press poetry editor until its asset sale in January 2016.

Books and awards

Sam Witt's first book, ''Everlasting Quail'', was selected by judge Carol Frost for the Katharine Bakeless Nason Poetry Prize given by the

Bread Loaf Writers' Conference The Middlebury Bread Loaf Writers' Conference is an author's conference held every summer at the Bread Loaf Inn, near Bread Loaf Mountain, east of Middlebury, Vermont. Founded in 1926, it has been called by ''The New Yorker'' "the oldest and most ...

run by

Middlebury College Middlebury College is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Middlebury, Vermont, United States. Founded in 1800 by Congregationalism in the United States, Congregationalists, Middlebury w ...

. His second book, ''Sunflower Brother'', was awarded the Open Competition from the Cleveland State University Poetry Center and was published in 2006 by Cleveland State University Press. Witt won the

Dana Award The Dana Award is a literary award presented in short fiction, poetry and novels. It was founded in 1996 by literature professor and poet Mary Elizabeth Parker with the financial backing of Michael Dana.''Poets & Writers'', September/October 2000 ...

for poetry in 2005. Sam Witt's work has been awarded a number of different awards since then, including: the Meridian Editors' Poetry Prize, 2008; the Briar Cliff Review Poetry Prize, 2008 for "Occupation: Dreamland;" and the Cultural Center of Cape Cod National Poetry Award, for "Dirge for the White Birds. . . ." "The Overburden in Hawktime" was chosen by poet

Nicky Beer Nicole C. Beer (born 1976) is an American poet. A 2017 MacDowell Fellow and 2023 Guggenheim Fellow, she is Associate Professor of English at University of Colorado Denver (CU Denver) Department of English. One of her poetry books, '' Real Phoni ...

as the winner of the 2012 Pinch Literary Award for Poetry. Witt's third book of poems, "Little Domesday Clock" was selected for publication in 2017 as a part of the Carolina Wren Press Poetry Series.

Poetry

* Witt, Sam. (2001). ''Everlasting Quail''. University Press of New England. * Witt, Sam. (2007). ''Sunflower Brother''. Cleveland State University Poetry Center. * Witt, Sam. (2017). ''Little Domesday Clock''. The Carolina Wren Press Poetry Series.

References

External links

*Jason Stumpf, instructor in the Department of English at Providence College, published a review of ''Everlasting Quail'' in a Spring 2006 web symposium on Contemporary Poetry, at https://web.archive.org/web/20110720030604/http://itdp.providence.edu/Faculty/Stumpf/p_Silva.htm
Witt's poem 'The Face in a Hospital Bar'Review of 'Little Domesday Clock'
{{DEFAULTSORT:Witt, Sam Living people 1970 births 21st-century American male writers 21st-century American poets American male poets British emigrants to the United States Harvard University staff Iowa Writers' Workshop alumni University of Virginia alumni Whitman College faculty Place of birth missing (living people)