Solmaz Sharif

Solmaz Sharif
Born Solmaz Sharif
1983
Istanbul
Occupation Poet
Language English
Citizenship American
Alma mater University of California, Berkeley,
New York University
Genre Poetry
Notable works Look
Website
solmazsharif.com

Solmaz Sharif (born 1983) is an Iranian-American poet. Her debut poetry collection, Look, was a finalist for the 2016 National Book Award.

Early life

Sharif was born in Istanbul, Turkey as her parents were in the process of immigrating from Iran to the United States; her parents had studied in the US during the 1970s but had returned to Iran during the Iranian Revolution.[1] Newborn Sharif and her family settled first in Texas, where her father finished his studies; the family moved again a few years later to Birmingham, Alabama, where her mother finished her Bachelor's degree. After her mother graduated the family finally settled in Los Angeles, California when Sharif was 11 years old.[1] While living in Los Angeles, Sharif was exposed to the largest Iranian population outside of Iran itself, but was ostracized by her Iranian peers upon her arrival because of her family's struggle assimilating.[2]

At sixteen years old, Sharif attended an Iranian Feminist Conference, facilitated by Angela Davis.[2] Here, she discovered the phrase and label "women of color", from which Mrs. Davis referred to the audience of women before her. This label was a punctum moment for Sharif, as this is the phrase that she had been searching for to identify with, and to embrace.

Wherever she went, she felt out of place. She never felt as though she was included or acknowledged by those around her. This feeling of exile is one of the bigger influences of her "exilic intellectual" prose- looking at something from the outside and to "question and interrogate" works of art or literature.

Education

Sharif received her B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley, and her M.F.A from New York University.

Career

She currently serves as a lecturer at Stanford University. In 2011, Sharif was awarded the "Discovery"/Boston Review Poetry Prize. Sharif received a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in 2013.[3] She has also received fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center, Stanford University, and the Poetry Foundation. Sharif won the Theodore H. Holmes '51 and Bernice Holmes National Poetry Prize.[4] She received a scholarship from the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference.[5] Her book Look was a finalist for the 2016 National Book Award for Poetry, a finalist for the 2017 PEN Open Book Award, one of The New York Times Book Review's 100 Notable Books of 2016, a Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2016, a Washington Post Best Poetry Collection of 2016, one of The New Yorker's Books We Loved in 2016, and one of the San Francisco Chronicle's 100 Recommended Books of 2016.[6]

Literary influences

Some early influences include poems by Walt Whitman, which her mother would read to her as bedtime stories. While studying at UC Berkeley, she was part of the People for Poetry program and studied June Jordan's works. More current influences include Audre Lorde's essay, "Uses of Erotics: Erotics as Power," Hannah Weiner's Code Poems, Muriel Rukeyser's The Book of the Dead, Martha Collins Blue Front, and M. Nourbese Philip's Zong![2]

Publications

Print Publications

  • "My Father's Shoes" in A World Between
  • "Your Style" in Spaces Between Us
  • "Suitcases" in The Forbidden
  • Three poems in jubilat
  • Two poems in Gulf Coast
  • "Break-up" in Black Warrior Review
  • "Personal Effects" in Kenyon Review

Online Publications

Works

  • Persis M. Karim; Mohammad Mehdi Khorrami (1999). A World Between: Poems, Short Stories, and Essays by Iranian-Americans. George Braziller. ISBN 978-0-8076-1445-7. [12]
  • Solmaz Sharif (5 July 2016). Look: Poems. Graywolf Press. ISBN 978-1-55597-940-9. [13][14][15]

Critical responses

  • Look, Sharif's first book, "asks us to see the ongoing costs of war as the unbearable losses of human lives and also the insidious abuses against our everyday speech."[16]
  • Look draws on the U.S. Department of Defense Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms, and challenges readers to confront the war's effects on language.[17]
  • Look was reviewed favorably by The Los Angeles Review as an account of war's effects on culture and language.[18]

Inspirations

References

  1. 1 2 Clemmons, Zinzi. "The Role of the Poet: An Interview with Solmaz Sharif". www.theparisreview.org. Retrieved 2017-03-25.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Clemmons, Zinzi (2016-07-27). "The Role of the Poet: An Interview with Solmaz Sharif". The Paris Review. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  3. ↑ "Solmaz Sharif | NEA". www.arts.gov. Retrieved 2017-03-25.
  4. ↑ "Princeton University's Lewis Center for the Arts Announces Recipient of the Holmes National Poetry Prize". Lewis Center for the Arts. 2017-07-17. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  5. ↑ "Solmaz Sharif Reads at Bread Loaf". New England Review. 2017-02-15. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  6. ↑ "LOOK". SOLMAZ SHARIF. 2015-12-20. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  7. ↑ "Stegner Fellowship – Current Stegner Fellows « Stanford Creative Writing Program". creativewriting.stanford.edu. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  8. ↑ "Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowships". Poetry Foundation. Poetry Foundation. 2017-11-13. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  9. ↑ "The Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers' Awards". www.ronajaffefoundation.org. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  10. ↑ "Solmaz Sharif Wins 2017 PEN Center Literary Award for Poetry by Harriet Staff". Poetry Foundation. Poetry Foundation. 2017-10-28. Retrieved 2017-10-29.
  11. ↑ "2017 American Book Awards announced! | Before Columbus Foundation". www.beforecolumbusfoundation.com. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  12. ↑ Elahi, Babak (2008-01-01). "Review of A World between: Poems, Short Stories, and Essays by Iranian-Americans, , ; Let Me Tell You Where I've Been: New Writing by Women of the Iranian Diaspora, Persis M. Karim". MELUS. 33 (2): 177–180. JSTOR 20343474.
  13. ↑ Times, Los Angeles. "Solmaz Sharif and the poetics of a new American generation". latimes.com. Retrieved 2016-07-29.
  14. ↑ Lund, Elizabeth (2016-07-12). "'Look' by Solmaz Sharif and other best poetry this month". The Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 2016-07-29.
  15. ↑ "Look by Solmaz Sharif". 2016-06-15. Retrieved 2016-07-29.
  16. ↑ "Look, by Solmaz Sharif, 2016 National Book Award Finalist, Poetry". www.nationalbook.org. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  17. ↑ "Washington Post Reviews Solmaz Sharif's Look and More by Harriet Staff". Poetry Foundation. Poetry Foundation. 2017-11-13. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
  18. ↑ "Book Review: Look by Solmaz Sharif - The Los Angeles Review". The Los Angeles Review. 2016-08-02. Retrieved 2017-11-13.
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