Lynn Melnick’s most recent book of poetry, I Deserve This, Thank You, received The Stern Prize from American Poetry Review and will be published by Copper Canyon Press in spring of 2027.

 

She is the author of the memoir, I've Had to Think Up a Way to Survive: On Trauma, Persistence, and Dolly Parton, from the University of Texas Press's American Music Series (October 2022). The paperback and audiobook are available from Spiegel & Grau.

 

She is also the author of three previous poetry collections, Refusenik (2022), the winner of the Julie Suk award, and a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award, Landscape with Sex and Violence (2017), and If I Should Say I Have Hope (2012), all with YesYes Books, and the co-editor of Please Excuse This Poem: 100 Poets for the Next Generation (Viking, 2015). ​

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She has received grants from the Cafe Royal Cultural Society and the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute. A former fellow at the New York Public Library’s Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers, and previously on the executive board of VIDA: Women in Literary Arts, she teaches poetry at Columbia University and Princeton University. Born in Indianapolis, she grew up in Los Angeles and currently lives in Brooklyn.

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Photo credit: Ada Donnelly