Nathaniel Mackey


Nathaniel Mackey is an American poet, novelist, anthologist, literary critic and editor. He is the Reynolds Price Professor of Creative Writing at Duke University and a Chancellor of The Academy of American Poets. Mackey is currently teaching a poetry workshop at Duke University.
He has been editor and publisher of Hambone since 1982 and he won the National Book Award for Poetry in 2006.
In 2014, he was awarded the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, and in 2015 he won Yale's Bollingen Prize for American Poetry.

Biography

Nathaniel Mackey was born in 1947 in Miami, Florida. He obtained his B.A. from Princeton University and his PhD from Stanford University. He taught and lived in Santa Cruz from 1979 to 2010. He is currently a professor at Duke University.

Poetry

Mackey's books of poetry include the chapbooks Four for Trane and Septet for the End of Time ; and the books Eroding Witness, School of Udhra, Whatsaid Serif, Splay Anthem, Nod House, and Blue Fasa.

Mackey's poetry combines African mythology, African-American musical traditions, and Modernist poetic experiment. His several ongoing serial projects explore the relationship of poetry and historical memory, as well as the ritual power of poetry and song.

Fiction

Mackey has published five volumes of an ongoing prose project entitled From A Broken Bottle Traces of Perfume Still Emanate. The books are titled Bedouin Hornbook, Djbot Baghostus's Run, Atet A. D., Bass Cathedral, and Late Arcade.

Criticism and editing

Mackey is the author of Discrepant Engagement: Dissonance, Cross-Culturality, and Experimental Writing, an influential book of literary theory, and more recently of Paracritical Hinge: Essays, Talks, Notes, Interviews. He has edited the avant-garde literary journal Hambone for more than 15 years, and co-edited Moment's Notice: Jazz in Poetry and Prose with Art Lange.

Awards


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