William Orem, M.F.A.,Ph.D.
Writer-in-Residence, Emerson College
williamorem.com
5 Judith Lane #12 Waltham MA 02452
(781) 647-4833
Ph.D. English, Indiana University, Bloomington, 1999
M.F.A. Creative Writing, Indiana University, Bloomington, 1994
B.A. Psychology and Neuroscience, Hampshire College, 1988
Dissertation: A New Poetics of Silence: Joyce, Beckett, Cage
NOVELS:
My novel Killer of Crying Deer will be appearing in September, 2010, from Kitsune Press.
My novel-in-storiesAcross the River won the Clay Reynolds Novella Prize from Texas University Press and appeared in 2009.
My first novel-in-stories, Zombi, You My Love, won the La Questa Press national first book competitionand appeared in 1999. It also won the GLCA New Writers' Award, formerly given to Louise Erdrich, Richard Ford, Sherman Alexie, and Alice Munro, as well as a grant from the Christopher Isherwood Foundation.
SHORT FICTION:
Sou'wester, Alaska Quarterly Review, Willow Springs, The Potomac Review, Plot, Dream International Quarterly, The Wolf Head Quarterly, The Paradoxist, Blue Lady, Robin's Nest, Sulphur River Literary Review, Parnassus Literary Journal, After Hours, 360 Degrees: Art and Literary Journal, The Tome, Midnight Zoo, Rural Medicine, Sinister, Los Pescadores, Flying Island: The Writers’ Center of Indiana, Me Three Literary Journal, Westview: A Journal of Western Oklahoma, Cabal Asylum, Night Train, Fortney Publishing's Holiday Stories, The Sycamore Review, Barkeater: The Adirondack Review, Margin, Hospital Drive, Improper Bostonian, Boston Fiction Annual Review, Emerson Review, Survivor's Review, Inflight Magazine, Shaking Like a Mountain, Oregon Literary Review
FICTION AWARDS:
Texas Review Novella Prize, 2009
Short-Listed for the Tom Howard short story contest, 2009
Reading by Invitation at the Boston Fiction Festival, 2007
Improper Bostonian Fiction Award, 2006
Semifinalist, Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center Fellowship in Fiction, 2006
Improper Bostonian Fiction Award, 2004
2nd place, Powells Books Literary Essay Contest, 2004
Honorable Mention -- New Century Writers' Award for the Short Story, 2003
3rd Place, New Century Writers' Award for the Novel, 2003
2nd place, Hemispheres Magazine Faux Faulkner Contest, 2003
Great Lakes Colleges Association New Writers' Award in Fiction, 2000
La Questa Press National First Book Competition, 1999
Pushcart Prize Nomination by Alaska Quarterly Review, 1999
Honorable Mention in Datlow and Windling's The Year's Best (fiction), 1995
Honorable Mention in The Missouri Review Short Story Awards, 1990
POETRY:
Windhover, The Princeton Arts Review, Sulphur River Literary Review, The Piedmont Literary Review, The Comstock Review, Midwest Poetry Review, The Yalobusha Review, Onionhead Literary Quarterly, The Wolf Head Quarterly, Rafters, The New Press Literary Quarterly, Liberty Hill, The Penware National Poetry Award, Confluence, Pike Creek Review, Minimus, Raconteur, Poetic Space, Wire, Rain Dog Review, 360 Degrees, Pleiades, Baybury Review, The Slate, Neologisms, Poetpourri, Sparrowgrass, Parting Gifts, Fledgling, The Stable Companion, Poetry Bone, Verse Unto Us, The Talking River Review, Poetry Motel, KYEzine, The Cracked Kettle Review, black bough, Point Judith Light, Haiku Headlines, Brussels Sprout, Frogpond, Modern Haiku, Smartish pace, Golden Apple Press' Skipping Stones, Runes, Purple Mountain, Exquisite Corpse, The Curbside Review, Knoxville Writers Guild, Grub Street Free Press, The No Tell Motel, The Southern Anthology, Potpourri, The Rockhurst Review, Erotic Readers and Writers Association, Oyez Review, Dogwood, Caesura, The Bellevue Literary Review, Color Wheel, Wisteria, J Journal, Rock & Sling, Hotmetal Press, New Verse News, Prune Juice, Survivor Chronicles, The New Formalist
POETRY AWARDS:
Semi-Finalist, Dorset Prize, 2009
Merit Award, Atlanta Review International Poetry Competition, 2009
Finalist, Tampa Review Prize, 2008
Reading by Invitation: Cape Cod Cultural Center, 2008
Semi-Finalist, Pablo Neruda Prize, 2008
Highly Commended: Open Poetry International Sonnet Competition, 2008
Residence with Artist’s Grant in Poetry, Vermont Studio Center, 2006 (declined)
Finalist, the Pablo Neruda Prize, 2006
Semifinalist, Kathryn A. Morton Prize in Poetry, 2006
Inclusion in The Treasure Chest (best of ERWA poetry online), 2006
First Honorable Mention -- Oregon State Poetry Association Awards, 2005
The Grub Street Free Press Poetry Award, 2004
First Alternate, Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center Fellowship in Poetry, 1998
Pushcart Prize Nomination by Sulphur River Literary Review in Poetry, 1997
Midwest Review Editor's Prize: nominated in Poetry, 1997
Honorable mention in the Writer's Digest Magazine Writing Competition for poetry, placing within the top 100 out of 12,000 submissions nationwide, 1996
The Penware National Poetry Awards, 1995
Featured Poet: Sulphur River Literary Review, 1994
My poetry has been featured on the NPR-based radio broadcasts The Linen of Words and The Poet’s Weave.
DRAMA:
My play And Clouds Made of Bones was performed by Firehouse Theatre, 2010.
My play The Seabirds was given a staged reading in Manhattan at Urban Stages in October 2009.
My play Ontological was performed at the Turtle Lane Theatre, 2009.
My play Trofimov, A Student was performed at the Boston Theatre Marathon at Boston Playwrights' Theatre in May of 09.
My play Cabman was performed at the Boston Theatre Marathon at Boston Playwrights' Theatre in May of 08.
My play The Seabirds won the Maxim Mazumdar New Play Competition at Alleyway Theatre in Buffalo, NY. It received its world premiere in September 07, and was given three and half star reviews.
My play Suspension was one of 14 chosen from a pool of over 1,200 for production at City Theatre's Summer Shorts Festival in Miami, FL. It received its world premiere in July 07 at the Carnival Center Studio Theatre in Miami.
Suspension was produced again in January 08 by Actors Theatre of Louisville.
Semi-finalist, The Source Festival, Source Theatre, Washington, DC, 2008
oWinner, the Wonderland One-Act Festival, New York, NY, 2007 (declined)
Finalist, The Boston Theatre Marathon, Boston Playwrights’ Theatre, 2007
Finalist, The Curan Repertory Company One-Act Festival, New York, NY, 2006
Finalist, The Boston Theatre Marathon, Boston Playwrights’ Theatre, 2005
DRAMA AWARDS:
- Katharine Cornell Award for Outstanding Contribution by a Visiting Artist, 2007
- Suspension was nominated for the Heideman Award at Actors Theatre of Louisville, 2008
- Ontological was nominated for the Heideman Award at Actors Theatre of Louisville, 2009
- And Clouds Made of Bones was a finalist for the Fusion Theatre Short Works Festival, 2010.
DRAMA IN ANTHOLOGIES:
Best Ten-Minute Plays 2009: Three or More Actors. Smith & Kraus, 2009.
BTM XI: Smith & Kraus, 2010.
ACADEMIC WORK:
Chosen to adjudicate the Tennessee Arts Commission Prize in Fiction, Creative Nonfiction, and Poetry. 2008
ACADEMIC WRITING :
- “John Cage.” Encyclopedia of American Poetry: The 20th Century. Haralson, Eric, Ed. 2001.
- Masticatione Mortuorum: A Source for "Corpsechewer"? Currently accepted with edits at
James Joyce Quarterly.
CREATIVE NON-FICTION / JOURNALISM:
“Darkness of Mind: How Dostoyevsky Helps Us Understand Timothy McVeigh” (Ryder Magazine); “When I Met The Exorcist” (Los Pescadores Magazine); “In Memoriam” (Non Satis Scire); “Mary’s Shelley’s Fatal Attraction” (Mystery Scene Magazine);“Genocide Machines: IBM and the Holocaust” (STNews). “Illumination” (This I Believe);"Hut of the Wanderer" (TransitionsAbroad.com.) Visual and performing arts reviews available on request.
CREATIVE NON-FICTION AWARDS:
My travel essay "Basho's Hut" won runner-up status in the 2008 Transitions Abroad travel writing contest.
ESSAYS ON FILM:
“The Monsters of Race: from Nosferatu to Blade” (Ryder Magazine); “The Aesthetic Defense: the Death of Leni Riefenstahl” (Dayton City Paper); “Terror Anonymous: John Carpenter’s Halloween and the Malling of America” (Dayton City Paper); “Peaceful Warrior and American Buddhism” (STNews.com); “Why We Don’t Need Superman” (Free Inquiry)
SCREENWRITING:
Finalist, Chesterfield Film Co. Screenwriting Fellowship, 2000.
Finalist, Chesterfield Film Co. Screenwriting Fellowship, 2003 (top 50 out of 2,593 applicants).
SCIENCE WRITING:
Science and Theology News, Research and Creative Activity, A Moment of Science, The College Magazine, Dayton City Paper, Science and Spirit Magazine, Indiana University Alumni Magazine, Society for Neuroscience, Vol. 15 (coauthor), Society for Neuroscience Vol. 16 (coauthor), First Annual Meeting of the Society for Biological Rhythms, Vol. 1 (coauthor), Science and Religion Articles of Distinction; The Foundational Questions Institute;
Skeptical Inquirer
BLOG:
REPRINTS:
Frontier Science, Christian Science Monitor; Institute of Philosophy, University of Zielonogorski; Altruists International; Scriptorium; Freerepublic; Tendencias21.net
ANTHOLOGIES:
And Know This Place (Indiana Historical Society Press), 2008
Hand Luggage Only (Open Poetry Ltd.), 2008
Rural Medicine (Hiram College Press), 2008
The Body (University of Tennessee Press), 2006
Exit Laughing (Hellbound Books), 2006
The Bedside Guide to No Tell Motel (No Tell Books), 2006
GRANTS AND FELLOWSHIPS:
Thomas Williams Fellowship, The Christopher Isherwood Foundation, 2003
Fiction Fellowship at the Herzen University Summer Literary Seminar in St. Petersburg, Russia, 2005 (declined)
Wilson Fellowship, given by Indiana University to one entering student each year in recognition of her or his merit as a creative writer.
SOCIETIES:
Modern Language Association
The Academy of American Poets
The Planetary Society
REPRESENTATION:
Loretta Barrett Books
Literary Agency of New York
101 Fifth Avenue NY, NY 10003
REFERENCES:
Cornelia Nixon, Professor, Letters Division Chair, Mills College, 5000 MacArthur Blvd., Oakland, CA 94613.
Peter Lindenbaum, Professor, Indiana University English Department. 408 Ballantine Hall, Bloomington, IN 47408.
Stephen Watt, Chair, Indiana University English Department, Ballantine Hall, Bloomington, IN 47408.
Full dossier available on request from Indiana University.