Shann Ray

Poet

ShannRay-016.jpg
Spokane, WA
Washington US

Author's Bio

Shann Ray is the winner of the Subterrain Poetry Prize, the Pacific Northwest Inlander Fiction Award, and the Ruminate Short Story Prize. American Masculine, his collection of stories, won the Bakeless Fiction Prize conducted by the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference and published by Graywolf Press. His work has appeared in Montana Quarterly, Poetry International, South Dakota Review, McSweeney's, Narrative, and StoryQuarterly among other venues. He holds an MA in clinical psychology from Pepperdine University, a Ph.D. in systems psychology from the University of Alberta in Canada, and a dual MFA in poetry and fiction from the Inland Northwest Center for Writers at Eastern Washington University. He grew up in Montana and spent part of his childhood on the Northern Cheyenne Reservation in southeast Montana. He lives with his wife and three daughters in Spokane, Washington, where he teaches leadership and forgiveness studies at Gonzaga University.

Publications & Prizes

Anthology:
Best New Poets (University of Virginia Press, 2005)
Book:
American Masculine (Graywolf Press, 2011)
Prizes won: 

Subterrain Poetry Prize for "The Suicide Elegies", Best New Poets open competition winner for "A Quiet Poem About Marital Sex", Ruminate Short Story Prize for "The Miracles of Vincent van Gogh", Pacific Northwest Inlander Fiction Award for "How We Fall", Crab Creek Review Fiction Prize for "Rodin's The Hand of God", Bread Loaf Writers' Conference Bakeless Prize for "American Masculine".

Personal Favorites

What I'm reading now: 
All About Love by bell hooks, The Way It Is by William Stafford, The Awful Rowing Toward God by Anne Sexton, Death and the Maiden by Ariel Dorfman, The Crucible by Arthur Miller

More Information

Gives readings: 
Yes
Travels for readings: 
Yes
Identifies as: 
Czech American
Prefers to work with: 
Any
Fluent in: 
English
Born in: 
Billings
Raised in: 
Livingston, MT
Montana
Please note: All information in the Directory is provided by the listed writers or their representatives.
Last update: Jul 30, 2010