Shara McCallum
Shara McCallum reading at Split This Rock 2018, Washington, D.C.
Shara McCallum reading at Split This Rock 2018, Washington, D.C.
BornKingston, Jamaica
Alma materUniversity of Miami,
University of Maryland, College Park
Binghamton University
GenrePoetry
Notable worksMadwoman
Notable awardsNational Endowment for the Arts Fellowship;
OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature for poetry
Website
www.sharamccallum.com

Shara McCallum is an American poet. She was awarded a 2011 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship for Poetry.[1] McCallum is the author of four collections of poems, including Madwoman, which won the 2018 OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature in the poetry category.[2] She currently lives in Pennsylvania.

Life and work

McCallum was born in Kingston, Jamaica, to an African Jamaican father, Alastair McCallum, and a Venezuelan mother, Migdalia Bertorelli McCallum.[3]

McCallum graduated from the University of Miami, from the University of Maryland[4] with an M.F.A., and from Binghamton University in New York with a PhD.[5] She has taught at the Stonecoast MFA program.[6]

McCallum directs the Stadler Center for Poetry and taught creative writing and literature at Bucknell University.[7][8] McCallum is now a professor of English at Penn State University. She lives in Pennsylvania with her family.[9]

McCallum's work has appeared in The Antioch Review,[10][11] Callaloo,[12] Chelsea, The Iowa Review, Verse, Creative Nonfiction, Seneca Review,[13] and Witness. Her poems can be found in a number of journals worldwide in places like the United States, the UK, Israel and Latin America.[14]

Religion

When she was a child, McCallum was raised practicing Rastafari; however when she migrated to the United States she stopped considering herself a member of any religion. Later in life, she converted to Judaism. McCallum was particularly fond of the idea that Judaism held about being part of a larger community than yourself alone. She found inspiration for her poems in the songs and practices, such as myths and rituals, of her religion. McCallum believes that her form of prayer and mediation is poetry.[14]

Honors and awards

Publications

Full-length poetry collections

  • The Water Between Us. University of Pittsburgh Press. 1999. ISBN 978-0-8229-5710-2.
  • Song of Thieves. University of Pittsburgh Press. 2003. ISBN 978-0-8229-5813-0.
  • This Strange Land (Alice James Books, forthcoming)[15]
  • Madwoman (Alice James Books 2017)[16]

Nonfiction

Anthology publications

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 National Endowment of the Arts 2011 Poetry Fellows Archived 27 November 2010 at the Wayback Machine. Nea.gov. Retrieved 20 October 2011.
  2. "OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature". Bocas Lit Fest.
  3. 1 2 "Shara McCallum". Poetry Foundation. 4 February 2020. Retrieved 4 February 2020.
  4. College Park Magazine | Feature | University of Maryland Archived 30 May 2010 at the Wayback Machine. Urhome.umd.edu (18 October 1972). Retrieved 20 October 2011.
  5. Shara McCallum, Poetry, Poems, Bios & More. Poets.org. Retrieved 20 October 2011.
  6. Shara McCallum Archived 6 October 2008 at the Wayback Machine
  7. From the Director of the Stadler Center for Poetry || Bucknell University. Bucknell.edu. Retrieved 20 October 2011.
  8. Shara McCallum || Bucknell University. Bucknell.edu (1 October 2011). Retrieved 20 October 2011.
  9. Shara McCallum | Directory of Writers | Poets & Writers. Pw.org (16 June 2009). Retrieved 20 October 2011.
  10. Shara McCallum (Spring 2001). "Jamaica, October 18, 1972". The Antioch Review. 59 (2): 281. doi:10.2307/4614160. JSTOR 4614160.
  11. Shara McCallum (Autumn 2004). "Penelope". The Antioch Review. 62 (4): 707. doi:10.2307/4614740. JSTOR 4614740.
  12. McCallum, Shara (2002). "Muscular Music (review)". Callaloo. 25 (2): 693–694. doi:10.1353/cal.2002.0090. S2CID 161249226. Project MUSE 6787.
  13. The Seneca Review. Hobart Student Association. 1998.
  14. 1 2 Davis, Todd F. (15 September 2015). "Embracing Mythologies". Interdisciplinary Literary Studies. 17 (3): 440–456. doi:10.5325/intelitestud.17.3.0440.
  15. Alice James Books > News & Events Archived 5 April 2010 at the Wayback Machine
  16. McCallum, Shara, 1972– (2017). Madwoman. Farmington, Maine. ISBN 978-1-938584-28-2. OCLC 945949128.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
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