Ilya Kaminsky

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Ilya Kaminsky (born April 18, 1977) is a Russian-American poet, critic, translator and professor.

Contents

[edit] Life

Kaminsky was born in Odessa, former Soviet Union (now Ukraine), on April 18, 1977. According to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, "Kaminsky lost most of his hearing at age 4, when a Soviet state doctor mistook a case of the mumps for a cold. He lost his homeland at age 16, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, when rampant crime, inflation and anti-Semitism forced the family to seek political asylum."[1] He immigrated with his family to the United States in 1993 after the U.S. government granted them asylum, settling in Rochester, New York. At the time, he spoke no English, and continued to write in Russian while learning English. He began writing poetry in English while grieving his father's sudden death from a heart attack, a year after the family arrived.[2]

Kaminsky earned his Bachelor of Arts at Georgetown University, and went on to receive his J.D. from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. He has been invited to teach and read poetry at literary centers, colleges and universities from Harvard to Naropa. He has also worked as a Law Clerk at the National Immigration Law Center, and more recently, at Bay Area Legal Aid, helping the poor and homeless to solve their legal difficulties. He currently teaches in the graduate creative writing program at San Diego State University, and lives in San Diego with his wife, Katie Farris.[3][4]

[edit] Writing

He began to write poetry seriously as a teenager in Odessa, publishing a chapbook in Russian entitled The Blessed City.[5] His first published poetry collection in English was a chapbook, Musica Humana (Chapiteau Press, 2002). His second collection in English, Dancing in Odessa (Tupelo Press, 2004), earned him a 2005 Whiting Writers' Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters Metcalf Award, the Ruth Lilly Fellowship, and the Dorset Prize, and was named the 2005 ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year in Poetry. In 2008, he was awarded a Lannan Literary Fellowship.[6] His poems have appeared in literary journals and magazines including the The Kenyon Review,[7] New Republic, Harvard Review, Poetry.[8]

Dancing in Odessa and its chapbook forbear, Musica Humana, have earned Kaminsky superlative praise from reviewers and prominent poets. The Philadelphia Enquirer wrote, "Like Joseph Brodsky before him, Kaminsky is a terrifyingly good poet, another poet from the former U.S.S.R. who, having adopted English, has come to put us native speakers to shame."[9] Jane Hirschfield wrote, "Inventiveness of language, the investigative passion, praises, lamentation, and a proper sense of the ridiculous are omnipresent. Kaminsky’s poems are wholly local yet unprovincial, intimate yet free of ego. This first full-length book is a breathtaking debut."[10] Carolyn Forche wrote, "Kaminsky is more than a promising young poet; he is a poet of promise fulfilled. I am in awe of his gifts."[11]

[edit] Honors & Awards

[edit] Works

[edit] Anthologies

[edit] References

  1. ^ Seattle Post-Intelligencer (seattlepi.com) > Friday, September 10, 2004 > Ilya Kaminsky's Poetry Turns His Losses into gGifts to Readers by Eric McHenry > Special to the Post-Intelligencer
  2. ^ The Centrum Writers Exchange > August 1, 2008 > The Sunlight of Odessa: Poet Ilya Kaminsky by Jordan Hartt
  3. ^ Blue Flower Arts > Author Page > Ilya Kaminsky
  4. ^ Ilya Kaminsky's Website > Bio
  5. ^ The Centrum Writers Exchange > August 1, 2008 > The Sunlight of Odessa: Poet Ilya Kaminsky by Jordan Hartt
  6. ^ Tupelo Press > Author Page > Ilya Kaminsky
  7. ^ The Kenyon Review > February 2009 > That Map of Bone and Opened Valves by Ilya Kaminsky
  8. ^ Blue Flower Arts > Author Page > Ilya Kaminsky
  9. ^ June 2, 2004 > In His Memories of Odessa, A Poet Pays Tribute to His Forebears by John Timpane
  10. ^ Ploughshares Spring 2006 > Authors & Articles: Editor's Shelf > Dancing in Odessa by Ilya Kaminsky
  11. ^ Chapiteau Press Titles > Musica Humana by Ilya Kaminsky
  12. ^ Poetry Foundation > Previous Ruth Lily Poetry Fellowship Recipeints

[edit] External links

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilya_Kaminsky"