We are pleased to announce that this year’s winner of the Beatrice Hawley Award is Jamaal May of Detroit, Michigan for his book, Hum. He will receive $2,000 and his book will be published in November 2013. The Cooperative Board has chosen one additional book for publication: Orphan by Jan Heller Levi of New York, New York. Her book will be published in January 2014 and she will receive $1,000.
Jamaal May was raised by two auto workers in Detroit, MI, where he eventually taught poetry in public schools. After making a living as a self-taught poet and musician, Jamaal went on to publish two chapbooks, earn an MFA from Warren Wilson, and be featured in Callaloo, Indiana Review, Blackbird, andMichigan Quarterly Review among other journals, films, and broadcasts. He’s the recipient of fellowships from Cave Canem, Callaloo, and Bucknell University where he was named the 2011-2013 Stadler Fellow.
Jan Heller Levi’s first collection of poems, Once I Gazed at You in Wonder, won the Walt Whitman Award of the Academy of American Poets, and poems from her second collection, Skyspeak, won The Emily Dickinson Award of the Poetry Society of America. She is the editor of A Muriel Rukeyser Reader, served as consulting editor for the new edition of The Collected Poems of Muriel Rukeyser, and is currently writing the biography of Rukeyser. She is also co-editor, with Sara Miles, of Directed by Desire: The Collected Poems of June Jordan. She lives in New York City with her husband, the Swiss novelist and playwright, Christoph Keller, and teaches at Hunter College.
Finalists for the award were: Lullaby (with Exit Sign) by Hadara Bar-Nadav, The WABAC Machine by Martine Bellen, DEAR P. by Victoria Chang, Aphoria by Jackie Clark, I Will Not Give Over by Rebecca Cook, how do i net thee by Shira Dentz, Selvage by Rebecca Dunham, Heroine by Tarfia Faizullah, That Name by Janine Joseph, Pink-Collar Brides by Emilie Lindermann, whelm by Dawn Lonsinger, Hover by Erin Malone, Bright Arc by Kyla Marshell, Blood by Shane McCrae, Namesake by Rachel Moritz, Dust Jacket by Alexis Orgera, Bat & Man by Chad Parmenter, Idiopaths by Bill Rasmovicz, The Tribute Horse by Brandon Som, Slow Weather Hymnal by David Welch, and catastrophiliac by Caroline Young.
Semi-Finalist for the award were: Reclaimed by Jaime Brunton, The Small Blades Hurt by Erica Dawson, Not Here, Not, Dead by Nik De Dominic, Let the Voices by Kevin Goodan, Women & Children by Eileen G’Sell, A Tongue in the Mouth of the Dying by Laurie Ann Guerrero, Render by Rebecca Gayle Howell, How to Escape from a Hotel on Fire by Andrew Kozma, Monkeys, Minor Planet, Average Star by Gracie Leavitt, length of fetch by Jesse Lichtenstein,Pinwheel by Marni Ludwig, Skunk Hammock by Cody Lumpkin, We Mammals in Hospitable Times By Jynne Dilling Martin, Mysteries in a World that Thinks There Are None by Gary L. McDowell, The Glad Hand of God Points Backwards by Rachel Mennies, Shadowbox by Nadine Meyer, Dismantling the Angel by Eric Pankey, Spike by Charlotte Pence, The Accounts by Katie Peterson, Inventoruim by Lisa Sewell, Here City by Rick Snyder, The Hunger of Freedom by Shelby Stephenson, The Inventor’s Last Breath by J. Hope Stein, and Cyclorama by Daneen Wardrop
Thank you to all who submitted manuscripts to the competition and for your interest in and support of Alice James Books. Best of luck with your writing!
Announcing the winners of the 2011 Kinereth Gensler Awards
December 22, 2011
Alice James Books is pleased to announce the winners of the 2011 Kinereth Gensler Awards: Viralby Suzanne Parker of New York, NY, Obscenely Yoursby Angelo Nikolopoulos of New York, NY and We Come Elemental by Tamiko Beyer of Cambridge, MA. Each will receive $2,000 and will become members of the Alice James Books Poetry Cooperative Board. Their books will be published in September 2013, April 2013, and May 2013, respectively.
Finalists for the award were: Pomegranate Eater by Amaranth Borsuk, Indescribable Cardinals by Jordan Davis, Fugue for Other Hands by Joseph Fasano, The Body as One by Ezra Dan Feldman, Lost Property Unitby Rachel J. Galvin, Phase Shift by Alan Gilbert,Rough Comfort by Janlori Goldman, From this Wild & Perpendicular Earth by Ricardo Alberto Maldonado,Big Thinker by Jean-Paul Pecqueur, On the Desire to Levitate by Alison Powell, Killer by Doug Sanders,Church of Needles by Sarah Sousa, The Inventor’s Last Breath by J. Hope Stein, Jacket of a Ghost by Michael Paul Thomas, Five Satans by Jeffrey Thomson, Landscape with a Burning City by Michael Tyrell, and This Skeleton Coast by R.A. Villanueva. The Alice James Books Cooperative Board commends these poets for their fine work.
Thank you so much for submitting your manuscript to the competition and for your interest in and support of Alice James Books. Best of luck with your writing!
Announcing the winner of the 2011 Kundiman Poetry Prize
Kundiman and Alice James Books are delighted to announce the winner of the 2011 Kundiman Poetry Prize: Matthew Olzmann.
We want to congratulate Matthew, a writer-in-residence for the InsideOut Literary Arts Project and the poetry editor of The Collagist, on his prize-winning collection.
In addition, we would like to congratulate the following finalists for their riveting manuscripts: Lux Aeterna by J. Mae Barizo, A Shelter of Leaves by April Naoko Heck, Fablesque by Anna Maria Hong, Artless Flower by Miho Nonaka, Hello::Ghost by Soham Patel, Bells by Cheryl Quimba, Trembling on the Brink of a Mesquite Tree by Brynn Saito, Theatre by Mei Underhill, and HypnoPompia by Yim Tan Wong.
The Kundiman Poetry Prize is made possible through the support of Fordham University and the University of Maine at Farmington.