Richard Oyama

Poet, Fiction Writer, Creative Nonfiction Writer

Chiang Mai, Chiang Mai
Thailand
Chiang Mai TH

Author's Bio

Richard Oyama’s poems, stories and essays have appeared in Premonitions: The Kaya Anthology of New Asian North American Poetry, The Nuyorasian Anthology, Breaking Silence, Dissident Song, A Gift of Tongues, About Place, Konch Magazine, Pirene’s Fountain, Tribes, Malpais Review, Anak Sastra, Buddhist Poetry Review and other literary journals. The Country They Know (Neuma Books 2005) is his first collection of poetry. He has a M.A. in English: Creative Writing from San Francisco State University. Currently retired, Oyama taught at California College of Arts in Oakland, University of California at Berkeley and University of New Mexico. Readings, Nuyorican Cafe, HOWL Festival, Studio Museum of Harlem, New York Book Fair, Basement Workshop, Tufts University, The Pennington Club, New York University, Amherst College, University of Massachusetts, Princeton University, Cornell University, San Francisco State University, UC Santa Cruz, Ft. Mason Art Center, Oakland Museum, Berkeley Public Library, Mission Cultural Center, Small Press Traffic, Church of Beethoven, Magic Theatre Poetry Series and Harwood Arts Center. Workshops and classes, Intersection for the Arts, California Poets in the Schools, NEA Writer-in-Residence at Basement Workshop, California College of Arts, San Francisco Art Institute, University of California, Berkeley, California State University, Hayward, University of New Mexico. Oyama's debut novel, A Riot Goin' On, the first in a trilogy, is forthcoming. He is currently at work on a full poetry manuscript and a young adult novel.

Literary agent: 
Mark Gottlieb

Publications & Prizes

Creative Nonfiction

Book:
Kartika Review Issue 5 Spring/Summer 2009 (Kartika Review, 2009)

Fiction

Anthology:
Adobe Walls (Kenneth Gurney, 2010)
Journals:
Ayumi
,
Contact II
,
Downbeat
,
Eastwind
,
Kinenhi
,
Obras Magazine
,
Quilt
,
Quindaro
,
Sunbury
,
Transfer

Poetry

Anthologies:
The NuyorAsian (Asian American Writers' Workshop, 1999)
,
Image and Imagination (Freedom Voices Press, 1997)
,
Premonitions (Kaya Press, 1995)
,
Dissident Song (Quarry West/University of California Santa Cruz, 1991)
,
Breaking Silence (Greenfield Review Press, 1983)
Book:
The Country They Know (Neuma Books, 2005)
Journals: , ,
Ballard Street Poetry Journal
,
Harpy Hybrid Review
,
Malpais Review
,

Personal Favorites

Favorite authors: 
James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, William Faulkner, James Baldwin, Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, John Steinbeck, Willa Cather, Jorge Luis Borges, Italo Calvino, Yasunari Kawabata, Natsume Soseki, William Carlos Williams, Wallace Stevens, Emily Dickinson, Czeslaw Milosz, Wislawa Szymborska, Robert Hass, Denise Levertov, Louise Gluck, George Eliot.
What I'm reading now: 
The Hotel by Elizabeth Bowen, Selected Poems by William Butler Yeats

More Information

Gives readings: 
Yes
Travels for readings: 
Yes
Identifies as: 
Asian American
Prefers to work with: 
Any
Fluent in: 
English
Born in: 
New York, NY
New York
Raised in: 
New York, NY
New York
Please note: All information in the Directory is provided by the listed writers or their representatives.
Last update: Feb 28, 2025