Naomi Shihab Nye
Encyclopedia
Naomi Shihab Nye is a poet
, songwriter
, and novelist. She was born to a Palestinian
father and American mother. Although she regards herself as a "wandering poet", she refers to San Antonio as her home.
She has won many awards and fellowships, among them four Pushcart Prize
s, the Jane Addams
Children's Book award, the Paterson Poetry Prize, and many notable book and best book citations from the American Library Association
, and a 2000 Witter Bynner Fellowship. In June 2009, Nye was named as one of PeaceByPeace.com's first peace heroes.
in San Antonio, Texas, and still resides in that city. She and her photographer husband, Michael Nye, have one son, Madison.
Nye's father, Aziz Shihab, wrote books such as A Taste of Palestine: Menus and Memories.
Poetry
Poetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning...
, songwriter
Music
Music is an art form whose medium is sound and silence. Its common elements are pitch , rhythm , dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture...
, and novelist. She was born to a Palestinian
Palestinian people
The Palestinian people, also referred to as Palestinians or Palestinian Arabs , are an Arabic-speaking people with origins in Palestine. Despite various wars and exoduses, roughly one third of the world's Palestinian population continues to reside in the area encompassing the West Bank, the Gaza...
father and American mother. Although she regards herself as a "wandering poet", she refers to San Antonio as her home.
Career
Her first collection of poems, Different Ways to Pray, explored the theme of similarities and differences between cultures, which would become one of her lifelong areas of focus. Her other books include poetry collections 19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East, A Maze Me, Red Suitcase, Field Trip and Fuel; a collection of essays entitled Never in a Hurry; a young-adult novel called Habibi (the semi-autobiographical story of an Arab-American teenager who moves to Jerusalem in the 1990s) and picture book Lullaby Raft, which is also the title of one of her two albums of music. (The other is called Rutabaga-Roo; both were limited-edition.) Nye has edited many anthologies of poems, for audiences both young and old. One of the best-known is This Same Sky: A Collection of Poems from around the World, which contains translated work by 129 poets from 69 different countries. Her most recent anthology is called Is This Forever, Or What?: Poems & Paintings from Texas.She has won many awards and fellowships, among them four Pushcart Prize
Pushcart Prize
The Pushcart Prize is an American literary prize by Pushcart Press that honors the best "poetry, short fiction, essays or literary whatnot" published in the small presses over the previous year. Magazine and small book press editors are invited to nominate up to 6 works they have featured....
s, the Jane Addams
Jane Addams
Jane Addams was a pioneer settlement worker, founder of Hull House in Chicago, public philosopher, sociologist, author, and leader in woman suffrage and world peace...
Children's Book award, the Paterson Poetry Prize, and many notable book and best book citations from the American Library Association
American Library Association
The American Library Association is a non-profit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 62,000 members....
, and a 2000 Witter Bynner Fellowship. In June 2009, Nye was named as one of PeaceByPeace.com's first peace heroes.
Personal life
Nye graduated from Trinity UniversityTrinity University (Texas)
Trinity University is a private, independent, primarily undergraduate, university in San Antonio, Texas. Its campus is located in the Monte Vista Historic District and adjacent to Brackenridge Park....
in San Antonio, Texas, and still resides in that city. She and her photographer husband, Michael Nye, have one son, Madison.
Nye's father, Aziz Shihab, wrote books such as A Taste of Palestine: Menus and Memories.
Early life
At the age of six, Nye began writing poems as soon as she learned how to write. She was influenced by her mother who read to her all the time. At first her early works were based on childish things such as cats, squirrels, friends, teachers, etc. It wasn't until she was fourteen that she visited her Palestinian grandmother; this would eventually become part of the messages in her many collections of poetry. Her book "Fuel" is an example. Some of her earlier works were published in Seventeen, Modern Poetry Studies, and Ironwood.Critical studies
- Gómez-Vega, Ibis. "The Art of Telling Stories in the Poetry of Naomi Shihab Nye." MELUS 6.4 (Winter 2001): 245-252.
- Gómez-Vega, Ibis. "Extreme Realities: Naomi Shihab Nye's Essays and Poems." Alif: Journal of Comparative Poetics 30 (2010): 109-133.
- Mercer, Lorraine, and Linda Strom. "Counter Narratives: Cooking Up Stories of Love and Loss in Naomi Shihab Nye's Poetry and Diana Abu-Jaber's Crescent." MELUS 32.4 (Winter 2007): 33-46.
- Orfalea, Gregory. "Doomed by Our Blood to care: The Poetry of Naomi Shihab Nye." Paintbrush 18.35 (Spring 1991): 56-66.
Forewords
- Clack, Cary, (2009). Clowns and Rats Scare Me. Trinity University Press.
Further reading
- Art at Our Doorstep: San Antonio Writers and Artists featuring Naomi Shihab Nye. Edited by Nan Cuba and Riley Robinson (Trinity University Press, 2008).
External links
- Profile and poems of Naomi Shihab Nye at the Poetry Foundation.
- Nye's page at Poets.org
- Guide to the Naomi Shihab Nye Papers, 1894-2008
- Nye's open "Letter to Potential Terrorists"
- Bill Moyers interview with Nye
- Interview with Nye in Pif Magazine
- Nye's page at the Barclay Agency
- Profile of Nye at the Institute for Middle East Understanding
- Photograph of Naomi Nye at a book-signing at The Twig Bookshop in San Antonio, Texas on June 12, 2008.
- The University of Texas at San Antonio houses a collection of papers from Naomi Shihab Nye. The collection includes the typescripts, manuscripts, drafts, proofs, and other pre-publication forms of the writings of poet and writer Nye. Writings include early and revised drafts of poems, essays, and other writings. Published work is supplemented by hundreds of unpublished poems.
