Richard Blanco

Richard Blanco was made in Cuba, assembled in Spain, and imported to the United States - meaning his mother, seven months pregnant, and the rest of the family arrived as exiles from Cuba to Madrid where he was born. Forty-five days later, the family emigrated once more, eventually settling in Miami where he was raised and educated. His acclaimed first book of poetry, City of a Hundred Fires, which explores the negotiation of cultural identity as a Cuban-American, won the Agnes Starrett Poetry Prize from the University of Pittsburgh Press (1998). Since 1999, Blanco has traveled extensively and lived in Guatemala, Brazil, Connecticut, where he was Assistant Professor of Creative Writing and Latino Literature, and Washington DC, where he taught at Georgetown and American University. His second book, Directions to the Beach of the Dead continues to explore themes of home, place, and identity (Unniversity of Arizona Press, Camino Del Sol Series, 2005).

His poems have appeared in major literary journals and anthologies, including The Best American Poetry 2000, Great American Prose Poems, The Breadloaf Anthology of New American Poets, and he has been featured on National Public Radio. Blanco received the John Ciardi Fellowship from the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, a Florida Artist Fellowship, and a Residency Fellowship from the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. A builder of bridges and poems, Blanco earned both a bachelors of science degree in Civil Engineering (1991) and a Master in Fine Arts in Creative Writing (1997) from Florida International University, where he studied with Campbell McGrath.