Alexander Kuo
Alexander Kuo (born 1941? in Boston, Massachusetts) is an American teacher, poet, fiction writer, and essayist.[1] He was a Professor of English at Washington State University, retired in 2012, and has taught in numerous academic institutions in China, including Beijing and Changchun universities. In 2002 he won an American Book Award for his Lipstick and Other Stories of the Before Columbus Foundation.
Contents
Early life and education
Of Chinese-American ancestry and born in Boston, Massachusetts, Alexander Kuo received his B.A. from Knox College in Illinois in 1961,[2] where he studied with Sam Moon and Gogisi. He earned an M.F.A. from the University of Iowa, where he studied in the Iowa Writer's Workshop with Donald Justice and Philip Roth.
Career
He was a professor of English at Washington State University (WSU), which lists him as an example of their "world class faculty."[3] He is the former chair of the Department of Comparative American Cultures[4] (now called Comparative Ethnic Studies).[5] In 2001, WSU named him their first Writer-in-Residence.[6]
He has been a mentor to the notable Native American writer Sherman Alexie.[7]
Honors
- Kuo has won multiple National Endowment for the Arts grants.
- He has held numerous teaching fellowships in China, including a 1989 fellowship at Beijing University, Senior Fulbright Scholar at Changchun University in 1991-92, and a Lingnan Fellow in Hong Kong in 1997-98. He has held positions at numerous universities in China including Peking University, Beijing Forestry University, Jilin University, and Hong Kong Baptist University.
- In 2002-03, he held the Writer-in-Residence position with the Mercy Corps.
- 2003-2004, he received a Rockefeller Foundation grant for a Bellagio residency.
- 2002, Lipstick and Other Stories won the American Book Award of the Before Columbus Foundation.[8]
Writing
His writing makes demands on the reader in a way comparable to Franz Kafka or Jorge Luis Borges.[9]
Works
Poetry
- The Window Tree (1974)
- New Letters from Hiroshima, and Other Poems (1974)
- Changing the River (1986)
- This Fierce Geography (1998)
Fiction
- Chinese Opera (novel, 1998)
- Lipstick and Other Stories (short stories, 2001)
- Panda Diaries (novel, 2006)
- White Jade and Other Stories (short stories, 2008)
- The Man Who Dammed the Yangtze: A Mathematical Novel (novel, 2011)
Notes
- ↑ Alex Kuo, "Damming the American West", Bluefish website, 2003
- ↑ "Poet Alex Kuo Judges Writing Awards"
- ↑ "Future Students: Why WSU?" http://www.wsu.edu/future-students/why-wsu/wc_kuo.htm
- ↑ Natascha Karlova, "On Lipstick, Rodeo Queens, Creative Compatibility, and Making a Difference," Ask. Magazine WSU College of Liberal Arts (December 2002), p.15.
- ↑ CAE Homepage http://libarts.wsu.edu/ces/
- ↑ WSU Press Release [1] (June 2001)
- ↑ WSU Press Release [2] (January 1999) Archived September 4, 2006 at the Wayback Machine
- ↑ "ABE List of Winners" http://www.bookweb.org/news/awards/1293.html
- ↑ Robert H. Abel, "Review of 'Lipstick and Other Stories'," Asian Review of Books (March 2001)
