Joseph Frederick Awad (May 17, 1929 – July 17, 2009) was a

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or writte ...

, painter,

public relations Public relations (PR) is the practice of managing and disseminating information from an individual or an organization (such as a business, government agency, or a nonprofit organization) to the public in order to influence their perception. P ...

professional, and executive. He was appointed national president of the

Public Relations Society of America The Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) is a nonprofit trade association for public relations professionals. It was founded in 1947 by combining the American Council on Public Relations and the National Association of Public Relations Coun ...

in 1982 and

Poet Laureate of Virginia The position of Poet Laureate of Virginia was established December 18, 1936 by the Virginia General Assembly. Originally, the Poet Laureate of Virginia was appointed without outside consultation by the General Assembly, usually for one year, in a ...

in 1998. Awad was inducted into the Virginia Communications Hall of Fame in 1992. His poetry has been anthologized with both Arab-American and Irish-American writers (see

List of Arab American writers This is a list of Arab-American writers. Arab-American poets Arab-American fiction writers Arab-American nonfiction writers and journalists See also *Arab American Book Award *Before Columbus Foundation *Kawkab America *The Society ...

Biography

Life

Born in the coal-mining town of

Shenandoah, Pennsylvania Shenandoah is a borough in Schuylkill County in the Coal Region of Pennsylvania. It is distinct from Shenandoah Heights, which is part of West Mahanoy Township immediately to the north. As of 2021, the borough's population was 4,247. Shenando ...

to Frederick Awad and Helen Dwyer. His father was a first generation Lebanese immigrant and his mother a first generation Irish immigrant. In 1939, after the death of his mother, his father moved them to Washington DC and opened a barber shop in the

Mayflower Hotel The Mayflower Hotel is a historic hotel in downtown Washington, D.C., located on Connecticut Avenue NW. It is two blocks north of Farragut Square (one block north of the Farragut North (Washington Metro), Farragut North Washington Metro, Metro ...

. Awad obtained a scholarship to

Gonzaga College High School Gonzaga College High School is a private Catholic college-preparatory high school for boys in Washington, D.C. Founded by the Jesuits in 1821 as the Washington Seminary, Gonzaga is named in honor of Aloysius Gonzaga, an Italian saint from the 16 ...

. He then attended

Georgetown University Georgetown University is a private university, private research university in the Georgetown (Washington, D.C.), Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded by Bishop John Carroll (archbishop of Baltimore), John Carroll in 1789 as Georg ...

where he was editor of The Georgetown Journal and cartoonist for the student newspaper ''

The Hoya ''The Hoya'', founded in 1920, is the oldest and largest student newspaper of Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., serving as the university’s newspaper of record. ''The Hoya'' is a student-run paper that prints every Friday and publish ...

'', and graduated cum laude with a BA in English Literature in 1951. While in school he worked for the Washington Bureau of the ''

New York Daily News The New York ''Daily News'', officially titled the ''Daily News'', is an American newspaper based in Jersey City, NJ. It was founded in 1919 by Joseph Medill Patterson as the ''Illustrated Daily News''. It was the first U.S. daily printed in ta ...

'', then later for Dave Herman public relations firm. He took graduate courses in literature at

George Washington University , mottoeng = "God is Our Trust" , established = , type = Private federally chartered research university , academic_affiliations = , endowment = $2.8 billion (2022) , preside ...

and night courses in painting and drawing at the

Corcoran School of Art The Corcoran School of the Arts and Design (known as the Corcoran School or CSAD) is the professional art school of the George Washington University, in Washington, DC.Peggy McGloneUniversity names first director of Corcoran School of the Arts and ...

. Awad went to work with

Reynolds Metals Company Reynolds Group Holdings is a New Zealand based packaging company with roots in the former Reynolds Metals Company, which was the second-largest aluminum company in the United States, and the third-largest in the world. Reynolds Metals was acquire ...

in 1957, from which he retired in 1993 as executive vice president for public relations.Orfalea and Elmusa, ed. Grape Leaves: A Century of Arab-American Poetry. Interlink Books, 2000. After time spent in

Louisville, Kentucky Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana border ...

and

Chicago, Illinois (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

, he and his wife Doris settled in

Richmond, Virginia (Thus do we reach the stars) , image_map = , mapsize = 250 px , map_caption = Location within Virginia , pushpin_map = Virginia#USA , pushpin_label = Richmond , pushpin_m ...

in 1963. They had ten children. Over the years, Awad held many local board memberships including, Commonwealth

Catholic Charities The Catholic Church operates numerous charitable organizations. Catholic spiritual teaching includes spreading the Gospel, while Catholic social teaching emphasises support for the sick, the poor and the afflicted through the corporal and spir ...

, Friends of the Richmond Library, and The New Virginia Review. He was also chairman of the Diocesan Communications Commission and vice-president of the Virginia Writer's Club. Joseph Awad died in Richmond, Virginia, surrounded by his family on July 17, 2009.

Public relations

Awad was appointed national president of the

in 1982 and chaired their prestigious College of Fellows. He was awarded the Thomas Jefferson Award for career achievement by the Society’s Old Dominion Chapter. ''The Power of Public Relations'' was published in 1985 by Praeger Publishers, NY. He was inducted into the Virginia Communications Hall of Fame in 1992.

Poetry

Awad published four books of poetry and his poems have been included in many anthologies and literary journals, including ''

Commonweal Commonweal or common weal may refer to: * Common good, what is shared and beneficial for members of a given community * Common Weal, a Scottish think tank and advocacy group * Commonweal (magazine), ''Commonweal'' (magazine), an American lay-Cath ...

'', ''

Parnassus Mount Parnassus (; el, Παρνασσός, ''Parnassós'') is a mountain range of central Greece that is and historically has been especially valuable to the Greek nation and the earlier Greek city-states for many reasons. In peace, it offers ...

'', ''The Kansas Quarterly'', ''The William and Mary Review'', and ''The Poet's Domain''. He was a member and eventual president of the Poetry Society of Virginia and awarded their Edgar Allan Poe Prize. Other prizes include The Lyric's Nathan Haskell Dole Prize and the Donn Goodwin Prize for Poetry. Awad was Poet Laureate of Virginia for the term 1998–2000.

Bibliography

Poetry *''The Neon Distances'', 1980 *''Shenandoah Long Ago'', 1990 *''Leaning to Hear the Music'', 1997 *''The Big Bang'', 1999 *''Late Into the Night'', 2009 *''Construction Ahead'', a chapbook with Irish poet Ger Killeen, 1989 Public relations *''The Power of Public Relations'', 1985 Anthologies * ''American Religious Poems'', an anthology by

Harold Bloom Harold Bloom (July 11, 1930 – October 14, 2019) was an American literary critic and the Sterling Professor of Humanities at Yale University. In 2017, Bloom was described as "probably the most famous literary critic in the English-speaking wor ...

* ''Grape Leaves: A Century of Arab-American Poetry'' * ''The Next Parish Over: A Collection of Irish-American Writing'' *'' Menton's Anthology of Magazine Verse and Yearbook of American Poetry'' * ''The Zero Anthology'' * ''The Poetry Society of Virginia Anthology''

References

External links

Poem, "Stopping at the Mayflower

br /> Poem, "America

br /> Poem, "Of an Evening

br /> Poem, "Villanelle

br /> Poem, "The Neon Distances

{{DEFAULTSORT:Awad, Joseph Lebanese Christians 1929 births 2009 deaths American poets American writers of Irish descent American writers of Lebanese descent Gonzaga College High School alumni Georgetown University College of Arts & Sciences alumni Poets from Pennsylvania Poets Laureate of Virginia 20th-century American poets People from Shenandoah, Pennsylvania