Alex Dimitrov (born November 30, 1984) is an American poet living in New York City.

Early life

Dimitrov is a first-generation immigrant, born in

Sofia Sofia ( ; bg, София, Sofiya, ) is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria. It is situated in the Sofia Valley at the foot of the Vitosha mountain in the western parts of the country. The city is built west of the Iskar river, and h ...

Bulgaria Bulgaria (; bg, България, Bǎlgariya), officially the Republic of Bulgaria,, ) is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern flank of the Balkans, and is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and North Macedo ...

, and raised in

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...

Michigan Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...

. His parents fled a communist Bulgaria shortly before the fall of the Berlin Wall. He attended the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

in Ann Arbor, where he studied with the poet

Anne Carson Anne Carson (born June 21, 1950) is a Canadian poet, essayist, translator, classicist, and professor. Trained at the University of Toronto, Carson has taught classics, comparative literature, and creative writing at universities across the Unit ...

, and received a BA in English and Film in 2007. In 2009 he received an MFA in poetry from Sarah Lawrence College, where he studied with the poet

Marie Howe Marie may refer to: People Name * Marie (given name) * Marie (Japanese given name) * Marie (murder victim), girl who was killed in Florida after being pushed in front of a moving vehicle in 1973 * Marie (died 1759), an enslaved Cree person in Tr ...

Career

Dimitrov is the recipient of the Stanley Kunitz Prize from the ''

American Poetry Review ''The American Poetry Review'' (''APR'') is an American poetry magazine printed every other month on tabloid-sized newsprint. It was founded in 1972 by Stephen Berg and Stephen Parker in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The magazine's editor is Elizab ...

'' and a Pushcart Prize. He worked at the

Academy of American Poets The Academy of American Poets is a national, member-supported organization that promotes poets and the art of poetry. The nonprofit organization was incorporated in the state of New York in 1934. It fosters the readership of poetry through outreach ...

for eight years, where he was the Senior Content Editor and edited the popular online series Poem-a-Day and ''American Poets'' magazine. He has taught writing at Princeton University, Columbia University, New York University, Barnard College, Sarah Lawrence College,

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College, and was ...

in New Brunswick,

Marymount Manhattan College Marymount Manhattan College is a private college on the Upper East Side of New York City. As of 2020, enrollment consists of 1,571 undergraduates with women making up 80.1% and men 19.9% of student enrollment. The college was founded in 1936. Hi ...

, and

Bennington College Bennington College is a private liberal arts college in Bennington, Vermont. Founded in 1932 as a women's college, it became co-educational in 1969. It claims to be the first college to include visual and performing arts as an equal partner in ...

. In June 2012 he published ''American Boys'', an online chapbook from Floating Wolf Quarterly. His first book of poems, ''Begging for It'', was published by Four Way Books in March 2013. His second book of poems, ''Together and by Ourselves'', was published by Copper Canyon Press in April 2017. Dimitrov published his third book, ''Love and Other Poems'', in February 2021. The title poem, "Love," was published in the ''American Poetry Review'' in their January/February 2020 issue, which featured Dimitrov on the cover. His poems have appeared in ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

'', ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'', ''

The Paris Review ''The Paris Review'' is a quarterly English-language literary magazine established in Paris in 1953 by Harold L. Humes, Peter Matthiessen, and George Plimpton. In its first five years, ''The Paris Review'' published works by Jack Kerouac, Phil ...

'', ''

Poetry Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings i ...

'', ''

The Yale Review ''The Yale Review'' is the oldest literary journal in the United States. It is published by Johns Hopkins University Press. It was founded in 1819 as ''The Christian Spectator'' to support Evangelicalism. Over time it began to publish more on ...

'', ''

The Kenyon Review ''The Kenyon Review'' is a literary magazine based in Gambier, Ohio, US, home of Kenyon College. ''The Review'' was founded in 1939 by John Crowe Ransom, critic and professor of English at Kenyon College, who served as its editor until 1959. ' ...

'',''

'', '' Slate'', ''

Tin House ''Tin House'' is an American book publisher based in Portland, Oregon, and New York City. Portland publisher Win McCormack originally conceived the idea for a literary magazine called ''Tin House'' in the summer of 1998. He enlisted Holly MacArt ...

'', ''

Boston Review ''Boston Review'' is an American quarterly political and literary magazine. It publishes political, social, and historical analysis, literary and cultural criticism, book reviews, fiction, and poetry, both online and in print. Its signature form ...

'', ''Poetry Daily'', ''Verse Daily'', and other publications. In February 2014, Dimitrov launched ''Night Call'', a multimedia poetry project through which he read poems to strangers in bed and online. Some of the components of the project included a video and a poem both titled ''Night Call''. On November 26, 2016, with the poet Dorothea Lasky, Dimitrov founded Astro Poets. Flatiron Books published their book, ''Astro Poets: Your Guides to the Zodiac'' in October 2019. Dimitrov published his fifth book, ''Love and Other Poems,'' in 2021 which the New York Times book review talked of a source of "impromptu shot(s) of delight".

Wilde Boys

On May 27, 2009, days after graduating from Sarah Lawrence College, Dimitrov founded Wilde Boys, a queer poetry salon that brought together emerging and established writers in New York City. Dimitrov has also held salons focusing on the work of queer poets

Joe Brainard Joe Brainard (March 11, 1942 – May 25, 1994) was an American artist and writer associated with the New York School. His prodigious and innovative body of work included assemblages, collages, drawing, and painting, as well as designs for book ...

Tim Dlugos Tim Dlugos (born Francis Timothy Dlugos) (August 5, 1950 – December 3, 1990) was an American poet. Early in his career, Dlugos was celebrated for his energetic, openly gay, pop culture-infused poems. Later, he became widely known for the poems ...

, Leland Hickman and

Reginald Shepherd Reginald Shepherd (April 10, 1963 – September 10, 2008) was an American poet, born in New York City and raised in the Bronx.

. A salon was also held in honor of

Elizabeth Bishop Elizabeth Bishop (February 8, 1911 – October 6, 1979) was an American poet and short-story writer. She was Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 1949 to 1950, the Pulitzer Prize winner for Poetry in 1956, the National Book Awar ...

, with special guests

Richard Howard Richard Joseph Howard (October 13, 1929 – March 31, 2022; adopted as Richard Joseph Orwitz) was an American poet, literary critic, essayist, teacher, and translator. He was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and was a graduate of Columbia University, w ...

and Gabrielle Calvocoressi. Wilde Boys ended on November 1, 2013.

Bibliography

Poetry

;Collections *''American Boys'', 2012 (Floating Wolf Quarterly) *''Begging for It'', 2013 (Four Way Books) *''Love and Other Poems,'' 2021 (Copper Canyon Press) *''Together and by Ourselves'', 2017 (Copper Canyon Press) ;List of poems

Nonfiction

*''Astro Poets: Your Guides to the Zodiac'', with Dorothea Lasky, 2019 (Flatiron Books)

References

External links

Begging for It

American Boys, an echapbook by Alex Dimitrov

The L Mag Questionnaire for Writer Types: Alex Dimitrov, ''The L Magazine'', 15. Sept, 2011
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dimitrov, Alex 1984 births Living people 21st-century American male writers 21st-century American poets 21st-century American LGBT people American LGBT poets American gay writers American male poets Bulgarian gay writers Bulgarian LGBT poets Bulgarian emigrants to the United States Gay poets LGBT people from Michigan LGBT people from New York (state) The New Yorker people Sarah Lawrence College alumni University of Michigan College of Literature, Science, and the Arts alumni Writers from Detroit Poets from New York City 21st-century Bulgarian LGBT people