“Never So Eloquently & Persistently Pursued”: Buckley’s Rolling the Bones Reviewed in Depth

We are happy to report that in the recent edition of New Letters Magazine (vol.77, Nos 3 & 4), book reviewer Walter Bargen gave Christopher Buckley's collection of poetry, Rolling the Bones (University of Tampa Press, 2010), a positively enlightening and thorough study.

The review, which was titled, Give God Another Chance, is a sincere breakdown of Buckley's underlying philosophy that is prevalent throughout Rolling the Bones. It is an interesting read, as Bargen is careful to pay homage to the "eloquently and persistent" way Buckley can make sense of "the large unanswerable questions that have dogged humanity since the beginning."

If I have a soul, I imagine
it's much like a '50s transistor
radio, palm-sized, pulling in static
from so far away, who knows
what they're saying.
- Christopher Buckley, Rolling the Bones

5-Stars from The Review Review

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Rip-tooth: A worthy successor to Hinrichsen's FIELD Prize-winning Kurosawa's Dog

In the latest issue of the Notre Dame Review, Dennis Hinrichsen, 2010 winner of the Tampa Review Prize for Poetry, received praise for his TR Prize book, Rip-tooth (University of Tampa Press, 2011).

It’s a compliment to read that Rip-tooth is a “worthy successor” to Hinrichsen’s widely praised 2008 FIELD Poetry Prize-winning book, Kurosawa's Dog, and a further honor that the NDR reviewer finds common elements with Kevin Prufer’s new book, In a Beautiful Country (Four Way Books, 2011), since Prufer has just been described as “an absolutely necessary poet.”

Our thanks to NDR, where some of Hinrichsen’s poems first appeared. Look for Rip-tooth on the UT Press site. http://utpress.ut.edu

Transcription: Dennis Hinrichsen, Rip-tooth, University of Tampa Press, 2011. Hinrichsen's new volume is a worthy successor to Kurosawa's Dog (2008), which included poems from NDR. It also has a certain amount in common with Kevin Prufer's book. Hinrichsen, too, grapples with history in the context of lyric subjectivity and family myth: "Johnny Cash is dead. / There are no more drive-ins, no USSR, // summer days at Lake McBride, / no more of Linda's laughter as light as a wren's. // History resolves into a man's nose / my uncle bites off // in a Colorado bar."

Fresh from the Cleaners - A Preview of "White Shirt" by Christopher Buckley

Here's a preview of Christopher Buckley's latest collection of poetry, White Shirt (officially going on sale next week through the University of Tampa Press site and Amazon). We just finished unpacking the first shipments today and couldn't be more excited with the final result.

Keep a look out for updates coming next week regarding availability and where to pick up a copy.

Christopher Buckley, who is the author of 17 books of poetry, teaches Creative Writing at the University of California Riverside. He received the 2009 Tampa Review Prize for Poetry for his collection, Rolling the Bones (available here), among many other notable distinctions.

"Whether he is addressing his departed friend(s) . . . or the great swell of the Pacific Ocean that haunts his dreams, the voice is always the same, modest and direct. This is a humble poetry of great truths and profound emotions . . ."

- Philip Levine, writing in Ploughshares

Florida-born Writer John Blair Wins 2011 Tampa Review Poetry Prize

John Blair, born in St. Petersburg, Florida, has become the first Florida-born author to win the Tampa Review Prize for Poetry, which celebrates its first decade of awards this year. Blair, who now lives in San Marcos, Texas, received the tenth annual prize for his manuscript entitled The Occasions of Paradise. In addition to a $2,000 check, the award includes book publication in Spring 2012 by the University of Tampa Press.

Blair’s earlier poetry collection, The Green Girls, was the 2003 winner of the Lena-Miles Wever Todd Award from Pleiades Press, and his short story collection, American Standard, was the 2002 winner of the Drue Heinz Literature prize and was published by the University of Pittsburgh Press. He also has two novels from Ballantine/Del Rey, Bright Angel and A Landscape of Darkness.

Tampa Review judges commented that The Occasions of Paradise “lives up to its title with ample moments of near perfection, both in its individual poems and in the book as a whole.”
“The poems are filled with lyrical abundance. The cadences uplift and inspire,” the judges wrote. “Each poem is not only terrific on its own, but is skillfully placed and arranged to contribute to a perfectly satisfying collection. The sheer abundance of creative energy in this book—the beauty of poem after poem at once spontaneous and brilliantly constructed—mirrors the deft hand of a creator that inspires with awe, transports with beauty, and puzzles with questions.”

“I came across Blair's manuscript very early in the judging process,” poetry editor Erica Dawson explained. “The poems immediately arrested my attention. When I finally put it down, Occasions of Paradise stayed with me. . . . I simply could not, or, rather, did not want to get the stunning collection out of my head. I'm thrilled to have had a chance to read it, but even more thrilled it has a home with University of Tampa Press.”

Winner John Blair has previously published his poems and stories widely in magazines and journals including Poetry, The New York Quarterly, The Sewanee Review, The Antioch Review, New Letters, and elsewhere. He is on the faculty at Texas State University, where he teaches American Literature and directs the undergraduate creative writing program.

While he didn’t grow up in St. Petersburg, Blair did spend a good part of his childhood at his grandparents’ house “in the middle of a cow pasture” in Lake Wales, where his father was born and raised. All the stories in his Drue Heinz Prize collection, American Standard, are set in Florida, and he earned BA and MA degrees from Florida State University in Tallahassee before completing his PhD at Tulane. Winning the Tampa Review Prize is a little like coming home.

A selection of poems from The Occasions of Paradise will appear as a “sneak preview” in one of the next issues of Tampa Review, the award-winning hardback literary journal published by the University of Tampa Press.

Judges of the Tampa Review Prize for Poetry also identified “The Old Dominion” by Jennifer Key of Pembroke, North Carolina, as runner-up for the 2011 prize. In addition, they announced six finalists:
Bruce Bond of Denton, Texas, for “For the Lost Cathedral”;
J. Matthew Boyleston of Houston, Texas, for “Viewed from the Keel of a Canoe”;
Diane Mehta of Brooklyn, New York, for “Black Pepper”;
Joshua Robbins of Knoxville, Tennessee, for “Praise Nothing”;
Carrie Shipers of Lincoln, Nebraska, for “Family Resemblances”; and
Charles Wyatt of Nashville, Tennessee, for “Angel into the Earth.”
The Occasions of Paradise is scheduled for release in Spring 2012. A reading tour of Florida to celebrate its publication is planned for National Poetry Month in April 2012, sponsored by the Florida Literary Arts Coalition.

The Tampa Review Prize for Poetry is given annually for a previously unpublished booklength manuscript. Judging is by the editors of Tampa Review, who are members of the faculty at the University of Tampa. Submissions are now being accepted for 2012. Entries must follow published guidelines and must be postmarked by December 31, 2011.

Guidelines are available at http://tampareview.ut.edu or by sending a self-addressed, stamped envelope to The Tampa Review Prize for Poetry, University of Tampa Press, 401 West Kennedy Blvd., Tampa, FL 33606.

Heather Sappenfield Wins Fifth Annual Danahy Fiction Prize

Heather Sappenfield of Vail, Colorado, has been selected as winner of the fifth annual Danahy Fiction Prize by the editors of Tampa Review. She will receive a cash award of $1,000 and her winning short story, “Indian Prayer,” will be published in Tampa Review 42, forthcoming in summer 2011.

Sappenfield recently earned her MFA from Pacific University in Forest Grove, Oregon, where she studied with Brady Udall, Pete Fromm, and Bonnie Jo Campbell. She lives in the heart of the Colorado Rockies with her husband and daughter. In 2011 her fiction has also been chosen as a finalist for the Tennessee Williams Fiction Prize and received Honorable Mention for the Doug Fir Fiction Award judged by Jim Lynch for The Bear Deluxe.

Sappenfield’s winning story draws from her attunement to the natural world and from her childhood experiences.

“My childhood was a wild ride,” Sappenfield says. “I don’t remember most of it, but things come back to me in vivid bursts that are saturated with emotion. It's the best type of genesis for fiction. ‘Indian Prayer’ arrived this way.”

With respect to the significant presence of nature in the story, Sappenfield explains, “I crave open spaces in daily doses, find in it regeneration, redemption, balance, and it is rarely absent from my stories.”

This year the judges also named an exceptional runner-up story, “Three Little Indians” by John Blair, of San Marcos, Texas. Blair is a widely published fiction writer and a professor in the Department of English at Texas State University, where he directs the undergraduate creative writing program.

The Danahy Fiction Prize was established by Paul and Georgia Danahy as an annual award for a previously unpublished work of short fiction judged by the editors of Tampa Review, the faculty-edited literary journal of the University of Tampa, published twice yearly in a distinctive hardback format. Subscriptions are $22 annually, and those received before July 15, 2011, will begin with the issue featuring Sappenfield’s prize-winning story.

The Danahy Fiction Prize is open to both new and widely published writers, with an annual postmark deadline of November 1. The $15 entry fee includes a one-year subscription to Tampa Review, and all entries submitted are considered for publication.

Complete guidelines are available on the Web at http://tampareview.ut.edu or by sending a self-addressed, stamped envelope to The Danahy Fiction Prize, University of Tampa Press, 401 West Kennedy Blvd., Tampa, FL 33606.

Used Book Sale to Support Book Arts Studio

The University of Tampa Press and its Tampa Book Arts Studio will hold their first-ever used book sale on Saturday, December 4, from 9 am until 3 pm at the Music Room of Plant Hall. All proceeds will support the handcraft and antique letterpress printing activities of the Tampa Book Arts Studio on the University of Tampa campus.

Over a thousand books of all kinds have been donated for the sale by Friends of Tampa Book Arts Studio and other interested supporters. They range from classic and popular novels and nonfiction titles, to more unusual books issued in attractive illustrated editions or books about books and book collecting. Most books will sell for $1, paperbacks for 25 cents, and there will some better books at higher prices.

The Music Room is located just off the main lobby of the historic Plant Hall, the former H. B. Plant Hotel, on the University of Tampa campus.

Donations of books for the sale are still being accepted. Phone 813-257-3099 for information on dropping off books, or for other questions.

Dennis Hinrichsen Wins 2010 Tampa Review Prize for Poetry

Poet Dennis Hinrichsen of Lansing, Michigan, has won the 2010 Tampa Review Prize for Poetry. He receives a $2,000 cash award and book publication by the University of Tampa Press for his winning manuscript, Rip-tooth. His book will be released simultaneously in hardback and quality paperback editions in early 2011.

Hinrichsen is the author of six books of poetry, most recently, Kurosawa’s Dog, winner of the 2008 FIELD Poetry Prize. His other collections include The Attraction of Heavenly Bodies, The Rain That Falls This Far, Detail from The Garden of Earthly Delights (winner of the 1999 Akron Poetry Prize), Cage of Water, and a chapbook, Message to be Spoken into the Left Ear of God.

Tampa Review judges praised Rip-tooth for its “toothy” delivery of “sharp, biting, fresh poems in a manuscript that is also deftly controlled and carefully shaped.”

“Rip-tooth explicitly affirms an American voice in the poetic tradition from Walt Whitman and Hart Crane through John Cage, John Ashbery, Mark Strand, and current poets,” the judges wrote. “At the same time, classical and international allusions abound in this rich, evocative collection. Individual poems have philosophical depth and surprising arcs from private experience to popular culture. There is energy, intelligence, and fresh, sometimes visionary language.”

Judges of the Tampa Review Prize for Poetry also identified nine finalists for the 2010 prize. They are:

Susan Berlin of Yarmouth Port, Massachusetts, for “Restaurants Where We Didn't Eat”;

D. C. Berry of Oxford, Mississippi, for “Zen Cancer Church and Saloon”;

Susanna Childress of Holland, Michigan, for “Entering the House of Awe”;

T. J. Jarrett of Nashville, Tennessee, for “The Moon Looks Down and Laughs”;

Steve Lautermilch of Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina, for “The Basho Dialogues”;

Travis Mossotti of Carbondale, Illinois, for “About the Dead”;

Yehoshua November of Morristown, New Jersey, for “God’s Optimism”;

E. I. Pruitt of Saint Louis, Missouri, for “The Bull in the Drawer”;

Sam Witt of Charlottesville, Virginia, for “Occupation Dreamland”;

Hinrichsen is recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship and two grants from the State of Michigan. His poems have appeared in journals including American Literary Review, Black Warrior Review, Crab Orchard Review, Field, Notre Dame Review, and Passages North, and have won awards from Carolina Quarterly and Poetry Northwest. He teaches at Lansing Community College.

A selection of poems from Rip-tooth will appear as a “sneak preview” in one of the next issues of Tampa Review, the award-winning hardback literary journal published by the University of Tampa Press.

Rip-tooth is scheduled for release in Spring 2011. A reading tour of Florida to celebrate its publication is planned for National Poetry Month in April 2011, sponsored by the Florida Literary Arts Coalition.

The Tampa Review Prize for Poetry is given annually for a previously unpublished booklength manuscript. Judging is by the editors of Tampa Review, who are members of the faculty at the University of Tampa. Submissions are now being accepted for 2011. Entries must follow published guidelines and must be postmarked by December 31, 2010.

Guidelines are available at http://tampareview.ut.edu or by sending a self-addressed, stamped envelope to The Tampa Review Prize for Poetry, University of Tampa Press, 401 West Kennedy Blvd., Tampa, FL 33606.

Tampa Review Prize Poet Benjamin Grossberg Wins National Lambda Literary Award for Poetry

Poet Benjamin S. Grossberg and the University of Tampa Press were honored last month with a national Lambda Literary Award.

Grossberg, who received the Tampa Review Prize for Poetry for Sweet Core Orchard, published last year by the University of Tampa Press, had his book selected as winner of the 2010 Lambda Literary Award for Poetry. He was on hand to accept the honor at the 22nd Annual Lambda Literary Awards Ceremony, May 27, 2010, at the School of Visual Arts Theater in New York City. The awards have been sponsored annually for over two decades by the Lambda Literary Foundation.

Sweet Core Orchard was chosen from an impressive list of finalists, including Breakfast with Thom Gunn by Randall Mann (University of Chicago Press); The Brother Swimming Beneath Me by Brent Goodman (Black Lawrence Press); The First Risk by Charles Jensen (Lethe Press); and What the Right Hand Knows by Tom Healy (Four Way Books).

Grossberg currently teaches at the University of Hartford. His poems have appeared widely in literary journals, including Paris Review, Southwest Review, American Literary Review, North American Review, and many others. His first book, Underwater Lengths in a Single Breath, won the 2005 Snyder Prize and was published by Ashland Poetry Press in 2007. His previous awards include a Pushcart Prize as well as several literary arts grants. Two poems from his Tampa Review Prize book were recently selected for publication on the Poetry Foundation website: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive.

Sweet Core Orchard, winner of the 2008 Tampa Review Prize for Poetry and the 2010 Lambda Literary Award for Poetry, can be ordered from the publisher at http://utpress.ut.edu



Ben Grossberg at the podium in New York City accepting the 2010 Lambda Literary Award for Poetry. Photo © Donna F. Aceto.

Christopher Buckley Wins 2009 Tampa Review Prize for Poetry

Poet Christopher Buckley of Lompoc, California, has won the 2009 Tampa Review Prize for Poetry. He receives a $2,000 cash award and book publication by the University of Tampa Press for his winning manuscript, Rolling the Bones. His book will be released simultaneously in hardback and quality paperback editions in early 2010.

Buckley is a widely published writer with several other major recent awards to his credit. He was a Guggenheim Fellow in Poetry for 2007-2008, and received the James Dickey Prize for 2008 from Five Points literary journal. He has also been the recipient of a Fulbright Award in Creative Writing to the former Yugoslavia, four Pushcart Prizes, two awards from the Poetry Society of America, and two NEA grants in poetry.

Tampa Review judges praised Rolling the Bones for its “local identity and global reach” in a manuscript “sensitive to political, economic, spiritual, and philosophical nuance.”

“Buckley offers thoughtful meditations on our part in a cosmic game in which a roll of the dice or the bones in California can rattle the foundations in Ecuador or Egypt," the judges wrote. “Buckley’s poems are dense with carefully observed details, heavy with rich images. Always evocative, sometimes surreal, Buckley renders even the most quotidian experience as something memorable, occasionally sublime.”

Judges of the Tampa Review Prize for Poetry also identified ten finalists for the 2009 prize. They are:

D. C. Berry of Oxford, Mississippi, for “Cancer, The Cellphone Texts”;
Alan Feldman of Framingham, Massachusetts, for “Beloved Young”;
Gary Fincke of Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania, for “The History of Permanence”;
Ed Frankel of Los Angeles, California, for “After Spicer”;
Jeffrey Greene of Paris, France, for “Beautiful Monsters”;
Frannie Lindsay of Belmont, Massachusetts, for “The Urn Garden”;
George Looney of Erie, Pennsylvania, for “A History of What Music Can Do”;
Martin Ott of Los Angeles, California, for “Children of Interrogation”;
Peter Serchuk of Los Angeles, California, for “What Remains”; and
Brian Walpert of Palmerston North, New Zealand, for “A History of Glass.”

Buckley was raised in Santa Barbara, Calif., and educated at St. Mary’s College (BA), San Diego State University (MA), and the University of California Irvine (MFA). His most recent books of poetry are Modern History: Prose Poems 1987-2007 (Tupelo Press, 2008), Flying Backbone: The Georgia O’Keeffe Poems (Blue Light Press, 2008), and And the Sea (Sheep Meadow Press, 2006). His poetry has appeared in The New Yorker, Antaeus, American Poetry Review, The Hudson Review, The Nation, The Iowa Review, Gettysburg Review, Ploughshares, The Georgia Review, The Kenyon Review, The Southern Review, Crazyhorse, Seneca Review, The Sewanee Review, Quarterly West, New Letters, TriQuarterly, Prairie Schooner, FIELD, and POETRY. He is also the author of a dozen additional books of poetry, two collections of creative nonfiction, and several critical studies and anthologies. He is Professor in the Creative Writing Department at the University of California Riverside.

A selection of poems from Rolling the Bones will appear as a “sneak preview” in one of the next issues of Tampa Review, the award-winning hardback literary journal published by the University of Tampa Press. The book is scheduled for release in Spring 2010, and a reading tour of Florida to celebrate its publication is planned for National Poetry Month in April 2010, sponsored by the Florida Literary Arts Coalition.

The Tampa Review Prize for Poetry is given annually for a previously unpublished booklength manuscript. Judging is by the editors of Tampa Review, who are members of the faculty at the University of Tampa. Submissions are now being accepted for 2010. Entries must follow published guidelines and must be postmarked by December 31, 2009.

Guidelines are available at http://tampareview.ut.edu or by sending a self-addressed, stamped envelope to The Tampa Review Prize for Poetry, University of Tampa Press, 401 West Kennedy Blvd., Tampa, FL 33606.

Caladesi Island Memoir Wins Preservation Award

UT Press is proud to announce that Yesteryear I Lived in Paradise: The Story of Caladesi Island by Myrtle Scharrer Betz won a 2009 Florida Preservation Award. The Florida Trust for Historic Preservation made the award "in recognition of the significant achievement in the preservation of Florida's rich heritage." The Trust designated the award to Myrtle's book specifically in recognition of "Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Preservation Education/Media."

The author, sadly, is no longer with us, but her granddaughter Terry Fortner attended the awards ceremony, with her husband Bob, in West Palm Beach on May 15. Terry and her sister, Suzanne Thorp, worked closely with the staff of the UT Press to make this new and enlarged edition of the book a reality. This award recognizes all of their good work as much as it does Myrtle's own wonderful story of her life on Caladesi Island.

Snapshots from AWP 2009 in Chicago

UT Press and Tampa Review were on display at the 2009 AWP conference in Chicago. It was a hectic three days in the basement of the downtown Hilton. We hosted several author signings, each of which brought new and old friends around to our tables for good conversation, hugs, and smiles.

Here are some snapshots from that memorable weekend, briefly identified, from top to bottom:

Photo 1: Poet Ben Grossberg, most recent winner of the Tampa Review Prize for Poetry, chats with a fan.
Photo 2: Left to right are Poetry Editor Martha Serpas, Danahy Fiction Prize WInner Amina Gautier, and Fiction Editor Audrey Colombe
Photo 3: Tampa Review Nonfiction Editor Elizabeth Winston talks with poet Cindy King, an English and Writing colleague at the University of Tampa.
Photo 4: Tampa Review Prize Poet Lance Larsen signs copies of his latest book, Backyard Alchemy.
Photo 5: Tampa Review Prize Poet Kent Shaw gets reaquainted with a friend.