nancy_dafoe_poetry-winner

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

About the Author

Nancy Avery Dafoe—winner of the Pirate’s Alley Faulkner Society’s 2016 gold medal
for Best Poem, is a writer, poet, and educator, who has published three books on teaching writing and education policy: Breaking Open the Box, Writing Creatively: A Guided Journal, and The Misdirection of Education Policy: Raising Questions about School Reform through Rowman & Littlefield Education in 2013, 2014, and 2016 respectively. Dafoe’s cross-genre memoir and poetry book, An Iceberg in Paradise: A Passage through Alzheimer’s, was published by State University Press of New York (SUNY) Press in 2015. Her poetry chapbook Poets Diving in the Night will be published by Finishing Line Press in November 2016. Her fiction work also appears in the anthology Lost Orchard, published by SUNY Press in 2014. Dafoe’s poems, essays, and stories have appeared in literary publications. Her work in progress includes a mystery novel. She has taught in both high school and college. Dafoe considers William Faulkner one of her inspirations and the greatest American writer. She is a resident of Homer, NY, where she lives with her husband Daniel, son Blaise, and dog Bogart. She has two daughters Colette and Nicole and three grandsons, Truman, Enzo, and Owen. She is appearing at Words & Music, 2016 with Poet Mark Yakich, who selected her poem to win, and poet Rodger Kamenetz, who judged this year’s
essay competition.