Patrick Phillips

Patrick Phillips is an American poet, professor, and translator. His most recent poetry collection, Elegy for a Broken Machine (Alfred A. Knopf, 2015), has been nominated for the National Book Award for Poetry. His poems have appeared in many magazines, including Poetry, Ploughshares, The American Poetry Review, Harvard Review, DoubleTake, New England Review, and Virginia Quarterly Review, and have been featured on Garrison Keillor's show The Writer's Almanac on National Public Radio. He has been a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Copenhagen, and teaches writing and literature at Drew University. Patrick Phillips grew up in Gainesville, Georgia, and now lives in New York City.

Honors and awards

• 2010 Guggenheim Fellowship
• 2009 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Poetry
• 2008 Translation Prize of the American-Scandinavian Foundation
• 2005 Kate Tufts Discovery Award, for Chattahoochee
• 2004 Bread Loaf Writers' Conference Fellowship
• 2003 "Discovery" / The Nation Award, Unterberg Poetry Center of the 92nd Street Y
• 2001 Sjoberg Translation Prize of the American-Scandinavian Foundation, for translations of the Danish poet Henrik Nordbrandt
• 2000 Fulbright Fellowship in Literary Translation, University of Copenhagen

Reviews

For me this is a real discovery. In many of the poems—‘Nathaniel’ or ‘Matinee’ or ‘Star Quilt’—the language is quiet and accurate, the details precise, and the emotions—though never insisted upon—are there, unquestionable and complex. Phillips never dawdles or repeats himself; he gets down what matters and trusts the reader to listen carefully. I don ’t mean the poems are casually written: the art here is in hiding the art, and he is that rare poet with the tact and chops to accomplish that. He always sounds like someone speaking in a trustworthy American voice, speaking to adults, even though his concern is largely childhood. What a find! --Philip Levine, Ploughshares, Spring 2009

Haunted by memories, could-have- beens and what-ifs... Phillips enacts the anxiety and grief of the knowledge that there is no escape from death, no matter how much we may love and protect someone. --Publishers Weekly, Starred Review, 2/25/2008

Chattahoochee is a tremendous first work. Anyone who goes to literature to connect more profoundly to their own lives and the world around them, to connect with what is important in light of the passage of time we all live with and against, will not find themselves disappointed with this book. —Sarah Estes Graham, Meridian

External links

• "Stray Questions for: Patrick Phillips", Gregory Cowles, The New York Times, October 24, 2008
• "Watching the Surface for a Sign", video of readings and an interview with Natasha Trethewey, Southern Spaces: An Interndisciplinary Journal about the regions, places, and cultures of the American South, Emory University, 14 April 2009
• From the Fishouse: An Audio Archive of Emerging Poets: Patrick Phillips
• American Life in Poetry, Selected and Introduced by Ted Kooser: "Matinee" by Patrick Phillips