Gary Gregory Gach (born November 30, 1947[1]) is an American author, translator, editor, teacher and poet living on Russian Hill, San Francisco. He has published six books.[2] His work has been translated into several languages (Arabic, Chinese, Czech, French, Greek, Italian, and Russian).[2] In 2004, he was appointed to serve on the International Advisory Panel of the Buddhist Channel, a Malaysian Buddhist news website.[2] A member of the Order of Interbeing, he teaches mindfulness in the tradition of Ven. Thich Nhat Hanh, at the Church for the Fellowship of All Peoples. He currently hosts Haiku Corner for Tricycle: The Buddhist Review.
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Gach was born to a Jewish family in Hollywood, Los Angeles in 1947. He was student body president of John Burroughs Junior High School. He claims to have had a mystic vision at the age of 6.[3] At 11, he read The Way of Zen by Alan Watts, beginning a lifelong interest in Buddhism.
He was formally introduced to meditation by Paul Reps and later studied Hasidic Judaism and Kabbalah, and was introduced to shikantaza by Dainin Katagiri Roshi.
He has worked as an actor, stevedore, typographer, legal secretary, editor-in-chief, webmaster, and teacher (most frequently of late, Stanford Continuing Studies). Besides Buddhism, he teaches haiku.
Gach's work has appeared in more than 25 anthologies, including
Over 175 appearances, including
Gach is a recipient of an American Book Award in 1999 for What Book!?.[4] He is recipient of a Northern California Book Award in translation (2007) for his work on Flowers of a Moment and shortlisted by them (2006) for Ten Thousand Lives, both by Ko Un. He is an honorary member of The Academy of American Poets. He is recipient of translation grants from the Korea Literary Translation Institute and the Lannan Foundation. Poets & Writers, Inc. has supported his readings through their funding initiative.