Christina Pugh Biography

Christina Pugh is the author of two books of poems: Restoration (Northwestern University Press / TriQuarterly Books, 2008) and Rotary (Word Press, 2004), which received the Word Press First Book Prize. She has also published a chapbook, Gardening at Dusk (Wells College Press, 2002). Her poems have appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, Poetry, TriQuarterly, Ploughshares, and other periodicals, as well as in anthologies. Her honors have included the Lucille Medwick Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America, the Grolier Poetry Prize, an individual artist fellowship in poetry from the Illinois Arts Council, the Ruth Lilly Poetry Fellowship from Poetry magazine, and residencies at the Ragdale and Ucross colonies.

In addition to her own poetry, she publishes criticism; her recent articles have discussed Emily Dickinson’s metrical “ghosts” and the role of imitation in creative writing pedagogy. Pugh has also reviewed the work of many contemporary poets and poet-critics in publications such as Poetry, Verse, Ploughshares, and Harvard Review. At present, she is completing another collection of poems that takes the sonnet’s volta, or turn, as a formal principle guiding the construction of contemplative free verse. She has also recently completed a critical book manuscript about ekphrasis (poetry that treats visual art) in twentieth-century American poetry.

Literary Awards

Ucross Foundation Residency Fellowship (2005)
Word Press First Book Prize (2003)
Grolier Poetry Prize (2000)
Ruth Lilly Fellowship (Poetry Magazine 2000)
AWP Intro Journals Award (2000)
Whiting Fellowship for the Humanities (1997-1998)