Shana Monica Ferrell (born November 8, 1975) is an American

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 ...

and

fiction writer Fiction is any creative work, chiefly any narrative work, portraying individuals, events, or places that are imaginary, or in ways that are imaginary. Fictional portrayals are thus inconsistent with history, fact, or plausibility. In a traditi ...

. In 2007, she was awarded the Kathryn A. Morton Prize for her debut book of poems, ''Beasts for the Chase''. Her novel, ''The Answer Is Always Yes,'' was published by

Random House Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by Germ ...

in 2008. Her third book, a poetry collection entitled ''You Darling Thing'', was published by

Four Way Books Four Way Books is an American nonprofit literary press located in New York City, New York, which publishes poetry and short fiction by emerging and established writers. It features the work of the winners of national poetry competitions, as well ...

in 2018 and was named a New & Noteworthy selection by ''

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 ...

''. It became a finalist for the

Believer Book Award Believer Book Award is an American literary award presented yearly by '' The Believer'' magazine to novels and story collections, nonfiction books or essay collections, poetry collections, and, beginning in 2021 (awarding to books published in 2020) ...

in Poetry and for the

Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award The Kingsley and Kate Tufts Poetry Awards are a pair of American prizes based at Claremont Graduate University. They are given to poets for their collections of poetry written in the English language, by a citizen or legal resident alien of the ...

Early life and education

Ferrell was born in

New Delhi New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament House ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

to a Punjabi mother and an American father. She received a bachelor's degree from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

and a

Master of Fine Arts A Master of Fine Arts (MFA or M.F.A.) is a terminal degree in fine arts, including visual arts, creative writing, graphic design, photography, filmmaking, dance, theatre, other performing arts and in some cases, theatre management or arts admini ...

from

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

's School of the Arts and is married to poet and editor

Michael Dumanis Michael Dumanis (born January 18, 1976 in Moscow, Soviet Union) is an American poet, professor, and editor of poetry. Works Dumanis’s first collection of poetry, ''My Soviet Union'' (University of Massachusetts Press, 2007), won the 2006 Junip ...

. Currently, she is the Doris and Carl Kempner Distinguished Professor at

Purchase College Purchasing is the process a business or organization uses to acquire goods or services to accomplish its goals. Although there are several organizations that attempt to set standards in the purchasing process, processes can vary greatly between ...

(SUNY).

Career

Ferrell won the "Discovery"/''

The Nation ''The Nation'' is an American liberal biweekly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's '' The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper tha ...

'' prize in 2001. From 2002 to 2004 she was a Stegner Fellow at

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

. Her writing has appeared in ''

A Public Space ''A Public Space'' is a nonprofit triquarterly English-language literary magazine based in Brooklyn, New York. First published in April 2006, ''A Public Space'' publishes fiction, poetry, essays and art. The magazine's Focus portfolios have exam ...

The Baffler ''The Baffler'' is an American magazine of cultural, political, and business analysis. Established in 1988 by editors Thomas Frank and Keith White, it was headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, until 2010, when it moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts. ...

Black Clock ''Black Clock'' was an American literary magazine that published twenty-one issues over twelve years. Edited by Steve Erickson, the magazine was "dedicated to fiction, poetry and creative essays that explore the frontier of constructive anarchy.. ...

Fence A fence is a structure that encloses an area, typically outdoors, and is usually constructed from posts that are connected by boards, wire, rails or netting. A fence differs from a wall in not having a solid foundation along its whole length. ...

Gulf Coast The Gulf Coast of the United States, also known as the Gulf South, is the coastline along the Southern United States where they meet the Gulf of Mexico. The coastal states that have a shoreline on the Gulf of Mexico are Texas, Louisiana, Mississ ...

New England Review The ''New England Review'' is an American quarterly literary magazine published by Middlebury College. It was established in 1978 by Sydney Lea and Jay Parini. From 1982 till 1990, the magazine was named ''New England Review & Bread Loaf Quart ...

The New Republic ''The New Republic'' is an American magazine of commentary on politics, contemporary culture, and the arts. Founded in 1914 by several leaders of the progressive movement, it attempted to find a balance between "a liberalism centered in hum ...

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 Review of Books ''The New York Review of Books'' (or ''NYREV'' or ''NYRB'') is a semi-monthly magazine with articles on literature, culture, economics, science and current affairs. Published in New York City, it is inspired by the idea that the discussion of i ...

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, Philip ...

Ploughshares ''Ploughshares'' is an American literary journal established in 1971 by DeWitt Henry and Peter O'Malley in The Plough and Stars, an Irish pub in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Since 1989, ''Ploughshares'' has been based at Emerson College in Boston. ...

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 ...

,'' and ''

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 hi ...

'', and in anthologies such as '' Language for a New Century: Contemporary Poetry from the Middle East, Asia, and Beyond'' (

W.W. Norton W. W. Norton & Company is an American publishing company based in New York City. Established in 1923, it has been owned wholly by its employees since the early 1960s. The company is known for its Norton Anthologies (particularly ''The Norton Ant ...

), ''The HarperCollins Book of English Poetry'' (

HarperCollins India HarperCollins Publishers LLC is one of the Big Five English-language publishing companies, alongside Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, and Macmillan. The company is headquartered in New York City and is a subsidiary of News Co ...

), and ''The Penguin Book of Indian Poets'' (

Penguin India Penguins ( order Sphenisciformes , family Spheniscidae ) are a group of aquatic flightless birds. They live almost exclusively in the Southern Hemisphere: only one species, the Galápagos penguin, is found north of the Equator. Highly adapt ...

Bibliography

*2008:''Beasts for the Chase'' (poetry,

Sarabande Books Sarabande Books is an American not-for-profit literary press founded in 1994. It is headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky, with an office in New York City. Sarabande publishes contemporary poetry and nonfiction. Sarabande is a literary press whos ...

) *2008:''The Answer Is Always Yes'' (novel,

) *2018:''You Darling Thing'' (poetry,

)

Honors and awards

* "Discovery/''

'' prize in 2001 *finalist for the

Asian American Writers' Workshop The Asian American Writers' Workshop (often abbreviated AAWW) is a nonprofit literary arts organization founded in 1991 to support Asian American writers, literature and community. Cofounders Curtis Chin, Christina Chiu, Marie Myung-Ok Lee, and B ...

Prize in Poetry *fellowships from the

MacDowell Colony MacDowell is an artist's residency program in Peterborough, New Hampshire, United States, founded in 1907 by composer Edward MacDowell and his wife, pianist and philanthropist Marian MacDowell. Prior to July 2020, it was known as the MacDowell ...

and the

Civitella Ranieri Foundation The Civitella Ranieri Foundation is an American artists’ community located at a 15th-century castle in the Umbria region of Italy. The Foundation provides four sessions of six-week long unstructured residencies every year to visual artists, ...

*Wallace Stegner Fellowship from

*finalist for the

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ferrell, Monica 1975 births Living people Harvard University alumni Columbia University School of the Arts alumni State University of New York at Purchase faculty American women writers of Indian descent People from New Delhi 21st-century American poets 21st-century American novelists American women poets American women novelists 21st-century American women writers American poets of Asian descent Indian emigrants to the United States American novelists of Indian descent American people of Punjabi descent