From DiscoverNikkei.org
Garrett Hongo
Poet (b.1951)
Born in 1951 in Hawaii and raised in Los Angeles, Garrett Hongo writes poetry and prose described as "expansive, for they touch upon the personal, social, historical, and philosophical" (from Suzanne K. Arakawa in Modern American Poetry). Hongo attended Pomona College, the University of Michigan, and the University of California at Irvine, eventually earning his Master of Fine Arts degree in English. He has earned many credits, including professor, director of a creative writing program, and founder and artistic director of the Asian Exclusion Act theater group in Seattle. Yellow Light was Hongo’s first book of poetry where he writes of the Japanese Issei, drawing from both his own family’s experiences and America’s history. His second book of poetry, The River of Heaven, won the Lamont Poetry Prize and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. In 1995, he released his book, Volcano: A Memoir of Hawai’i, a memoir about his journey to Volcano, a small town in Hawaii where he was born, to find answers about himself by returning to his past. Garrett Hongo currently resides in Eugene, Oregon, with his wife and their two sons.
Sources:
- Faculty profile: University of Oregon, Creative Writing Dept.
- Peter Monaghan, "How a Small, Nondescript Writing Program Achieved Distinction". Chronicle of Higher Education April 24, 1998 (republished on Univ. of Oregon web site)
- "Garrett Hongo": Modern American Poetry.
- "The Mirror Diary" (excerpt). The Georgia Review Summer 2004.
- "Elegy, Kahuku". The Georgia Review Summer 2004.
- "The Legend". www.poets.org; includes audio file of Hongo reading his work.
- Garrett Hongo's The River of Heaven (Knopf, 1988) won the Lamont Poetry Prize. His most recent book is Volcano: A Memoir of Hawai‘i (Alfred A. Knopf, 1995; reissued in paper by Vintage, 2004).
- Amy Ling, "Garrett Kaoru Hongo" (Heath Online Instructor's Guide)
- Suggests classroom activities based on Hongo's works, excerpted in the Heath Anthology of American Literature.