Nick Flynn - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Nick Flynn is an American writer, playwright, and poet

Poetry of the United States

American poetry, the poetry of the United States, arose first as efforts by colonists to add their voices to English poetry in the 17th century, well before the constitutional unification of the thirteen colonies...

. His most recent publication is a play, Alice Invents a Little Game and Alice Always Wins. Previous books include a memoir, Another Bullshit Night in Suck City
Another Bullshit Night in Suck City
Another Bullshit Night in Suck City is a memoir by playwright and poet Nick Flynn, describing Flynn's reunion with his estranged father Jonathan -- an alcoholic resident of the homeless shelter where Nick was a social worker in the late 1980s. The title refers to Jonathan's description of homeless...

, and two collections of poetry: Blind Huber, and Some Ether, which won the inaugural PEN/Joyce Osterweil Award and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize.

Biography

He was born and grew up in Scituate, Massachusetts

Massachusetts

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

, south of Boston. His parents divorce

Divorce

Divorce is the final termination of a marital union, canceling the legal duties and responsibilities of marriage and dissolving the bonds of matrimony between the parties...

d when he was young and his mother committed suicide

Suicide

Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...

when he was 22. He drifted through several jobs before starting work at a homeless shelter

Homeless shelter

Homeless shelters are temporary residences for homeless people which seek to protect vulnerable populations from the often devastating effects of homelessness while simultaneously reducing the environmental impact on the community...

in Boston, where at age twenty-seven, he met his estranged, homeless father for the first time. Flynn earned an Master of Fine Arts

Master of Fine Arts

A Master of Fine Arts is a graduate degree typically requiring 2–3 years of postgraduate study beyond the bachelor's degree , although the term of study will vary by country or by university. The MFA is usually awarded in visual arts, creative writing, filmmaking, dance, or theatre/performing arts...

in creative writing from New York University

New York University

New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...

and teaches part-time at the University of Houston Creative Writing Program

University of Houston Creative Writing Program

The University of Houston Creative Writing program is a graduate fiction and poetry program located in Houston, Texas. It was rated second in the nation by U.S. News & World Report in its first annual ranking of writing programs in 1997. It rated 26th in the nation in Poets & Writers and its PhD...

. He used to teach at Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

, where he was a poet and educator. His long-time partner is actress Lili Taylor

Lili Taylor

Lili Anne Taylor is an American actress notable for her appearances in such award-winning indie films as Mystic Pizza, Say Anything..., Short Cuts and I Shot Andy Warhol, and the acclaimed TV show Six Feet Under....

, with whom he shares a home in New York.

Flynn's works have inspired the movie Being Flynn. Flynn's works have appeared in New American Poets: A Bread Loaf Anthology, American Poetry: The Next Generation, The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...

, The Nation, Fence, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

, and The Paris Review.

Awards

2001 Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellowships are American grants that have been awarded annually since 1925 by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the arts." Each year, the foundation makes...
2001 Witter Bynner Fellowship
Witter Bynner Fellowship
Witter Bynner Fellowships are administered by the Library of Congress and sponsored by the Witter Bynner Foundation for Poetry, an organization that provides grant support for poetry programs through nonprofit organizations. Fellows are chosen by the U.S...
2001 Amy Lowell Poetry Travelling Scholarship
Amy Lowell Poetry Travelling Scholarship
The Amy Lowell Poetry Travelling Scholarship is given annually to a U.S.-born poet to spend one year outside North America in a country the recipient feels will most advance his or her work....
1999 Discovery/The Nation Award for his poem, Bag of Mice, about his mother's suicide.
1999 PEN/Joyce Osterweil Award
1999 Larry Levis Prize (Virginia Commonwealth University
Virginia Commonwealth University
Virginia Commonwealth University is a public university located in Richmond, Virginia. It comprises two campuses in the Downtown Richmond area, the product of a merger between the Richmond Professional Institute and the Medical College of Virginia in 1968...

)

External links

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