Rebecca Gayle Howell

Rebecca Gayle Howell (born August 10, 1975 in Lexington, Kentucky)^[1] is an American writer and translator.^[2]

Education and career

Howell was born to a working-class family in Lexington, Kentucky on August 10, 1975 to Pauline Neace Howell and James Farris Howell. She earned her BA and her MA at the University of Kentucky, her MFA at Drew University, and her PhD at Texas Tech University. Howell also apprenticed under the Southern experimental art photographer and writer James Baker Hall, as well as the feminist poet and critic Alicia Ostriker. Other mentors include Carolyn Forché, Nikky Finney, Gerald Stern, Wendell Berry, and Jean Valentine. Among her awards is a 2014 Pushcart Prize^[3] and two poetry fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center.

In 2014, she joined the staff of The Oxford American as Poetry Editor.^[4]

Works

Howell's debut poetry collection Render / An Apocalypse was selected by Nick Flynn for the Cleveland State University Poetry Center First Book Prize in 2012^[5] and was a finalist for ForeWord Review's Book of the Year.^[6]

Howell's second collection, American Purgatory, was selected by Don Share for The Sexton Prize and was released by Eyewear Publishing to both the United Kingdom and the United States in early 2017.^[7]

Howell is also the English translator of Amal al-Jubouri's verse memoir of the Iraq War, Hagar Before the Occupation/Hagar After the Occupation,^[8] which was a finalist for Three Percent's Best Translated Book Award.^[9]

Awards

• 2016 The Sexton Prize. Eyewear Publishing.
• 2016 Al Smith Individual Artist Fellowship, Kentucky Arts Council.^[10]
• 2014 Pushcart Prize. XXXIX. Best of the Small Presses. Edited by Bill Henderson.^[11]
• 2014 Poetry Fellow, 2nd year. Fine Arts Work Center. Provincetown, MA.
• 2013 Finalist, Poetry Book of the Year. ForeWord Review. For Render / An Apocalypse. CSU Poetry Center.^[12]
• 2012 Cleveland State University Poetry Center First Book Prize. For Render /An Apocalypse.^[13]
• 2012 Finalist, Best Translated Book Award. Three Percent. For Hagar Before the Occupation / Hagar After the Occupation. Alice James Books.^[14]
• 2011 Best Book of Poetry. Library Journal. For Hagar Before the Occupation / Hagar After the Occupation. Alice James Books.
• 2010 Poetry Fellow. Fine Arts Work Center. Provincetown, MA.

Books

• American Purgatory, poems by Rebecca Gayle Howell. (Eyewear Publishing, 2017).
• Render / An Apocalypse, poems by Rebecca Gayle Howell. (Cleveland State University Poetry Center, 2013).
• Hagar Before the Occupation / Hagar After the Occupation, poems by Amal al-Jubouri and translated by Rebecca Gayle Howell with Husam Qaisi. (Alice James Books, 2011).
• Plundering Appalachia: The Tragedy of Mountaintop Removal Coal Mining. Edited by Tom Butler and George Wuerthner. (Earth Aware, 2009).
• This is Home Now: Kentucky’s Holocaust Survivors Speak, interviews by Arwen Donahue and photographs by Rebecca Gayle Howell. (University Press of Kentucky, 2009).

References

^{[15] [16] [17]}

• The Courier-Journal > review of Render / An Apocalypse
• Cleveland State University Poetry Center > First Book Prize
• Asymptote > review of Hagar
• Three Percent's Best Translated Book Award > review of Hagar
• Library Journal > review of Hagar

External links

• Interviewer: WMFA.
• Smith College Poetry Center > Rebecca Gayle Howell bio
• Interview: Out of Our Minds with J.P. Dancing Bear.
• Audio: “How to Be a Pig.” The Bluecast.
• Interviewer: M. Lynx Qauley. Arabic Literature (in English). January 31.
• Interviewer: Rafael FJ Alvarado. Translated By. World Wide Word Radio Network.
• Howell's official website
• Fine Arts Work Center > Rebecca Gayle Howell bio