Anna Akhmatova Award for Excellence

The $5,000 Anna Akhmatova Award for Excellence honors the memory of Anna Akhmatova, a great Russian poet, translator, critic and memoirist. She was the author of numerous books and is considered one of the world’s greatest poets. Her work was suppressed in Stalinist Russia during her life-time but is now available in many translations worldwide.

This Year's Anna Akhmatova Award Winner is TOM BISSEL.

"Reading Tom Bissell's God Lives in St. Petersburg, I kept stopping to admire, to reread sentences, to laugh out loud at the weird aptness of his language and situations. Adrift in the distant regions of foreign cultures and their own psyches, his characters soldier toward some salvation that never arrives, but remains tantalizingly apparent in the heat shimmering up from their longing. I found him to be a wicked good writer who, in these stories, never flinched."

-- Kim Addonizio, Judge's Citation for Anna Akhmatova Award for Excellence in Literature

Finalists

Selah Saterson
Jane Turner Rylands
Anele Rubin
David Keplinger
Lia Purpura
Martha Hollander
Judith Hemschemeyer
Judith Hope
Mary Jo Bang
Bonnie J Rough
Paula Bohince
Jennifer Militello
Deborah Bernhardt
Leslee Becker
Nina Barragan
Debra Spark
Helen Valenta
Matthew Pitt
Ionna Carlsen

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About this year's judge: Kim Addonizio's numerous books include four poetry collections, most recently What is This Thing Called Love (W.W. Norton). Her most recent book of prose, a novel Little Beauties, was named Best Novel of the Month for Book of the Month Club and a Target "Breakout Authors" selection, and her new novel, My Dreams Out in the Street, is forthcoming in 2007 (both from Simon & Schuster). She has also published a collection of stories from FC2, In the Box Called Pleasure; and The Poet's Companion: A Guide to the Pleasures of Writing Poetry (W.W. Norton), co-authored with Dorianne Laux. With Cheryl Dumesnil she co-edited Dorothy Parker's Elbow, an anthology of writing on tattoos (Warner Books). Her essays, poetry, and fiction have appeared widely in literary journals, anthologies, and textbooks. Addonizio's work has been recognized with two NEA Fellowships, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a National Book Award nomination, a Pushcart Prize, and other awards. She lives in Oakland, CA, and online at www.kimaddonizio.com.

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Other Grants and Opportunities

In addition to this Award, the Foundation will also give other grants to support the work of American authors whose writings reflect, in some way, the literary interests of Anna Akhmatova. These grants will be awarded by the internal nomination, to support the publication and promotion of such works. More information on this program will be available soon.