Wanda Coleman (1946–2013)
Author of A War of Eyes and Other Stories
About the Author
Wanda Coleman was born in Los Angeles, California on November 13, 1946. She attended Los Angeles Valley College and California State Los Angeles but did not earn a degree. In the early 1970s, she embarked on a journalism career with an assignment from the Los Angeles Free Press to write about a show more fundraiser for Black Panther supporter Angela Davis. However, her sarcastic coverage caused consternation in the Davis camp, and she was blackballed by the underground paper for a decade. In 1975 she landed a job writing for the NBC soap opera Days of Our Lives and won a daytime Emmy for her work the following year. She took writing workshops around Los Angeles. Her first book of poetry, Art in the Court of the Blue Fag, was published in 1977. During her lifetime, she wrote more than 20 books including Mad Dog, Black Lady; Imagoes; Heavy Daughter Blues; Mercurochrome; and The Riot Inside Me: More Trials and Tremors. She won the Lenore Marshall National Poetry Prize from the Academy of American Poets in 1999 for Bathwater Wine. In 2012, she received the Shelley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America. She died after a long illness on November 22, 2013 at the age of 67. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Image credit: BEYOND BAROQUE
Works by Wanda Coleman
Poetry NZ (Volume XVIII) 1 copy
Buying Primo Time 1 copy
Associated Works
Breaking Ice: An Anthology of Contemporary African-American Fiction (1990) — Contributor — 274 copies
In Search of Color Everywhere: A Collection of African-American Poetry (1656) — Contributor — 100 copies
Angles of Ascent: A Norton Anthology of Contemporary African American Poetry (2013) — Contributor — 42 copies
The Geography Of Home: California's Poetry Of Place (California Poetry Series) (1999) — Contributor — 41 copies
The Strange History of Suzanne LaFleshe and Other Stories of Women and Fatness (2003) — Contributor — 27 copies
The Unforgetting Heart: An Anthology of Short Stories by African American Women (1859-1993) (1993) — Contributor — 23 copies
The New York quarterly : NYQ : Number 36, Summer 1988 — Contributor — 1 copy
Black Clock 7 — Contributor — 1 copy
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Birthdate
- 1946-11-13
- Date of death
- 2013-11-22
- Gender
- female
- Nationality
- USA
- Birthplace
- Los Angeles, California, USA
- Place of death
- Los Angeles, California, USA
- Occupations
- Writer
Performer
editor (production)
proofreader
editor (magazine)
waitress (show all 8)
recruiter (Peace Corps/Vista; 1968-75)
staff writer (Days of Our Lives, National Broadcasting Co. [1968]) - Relationships
- Straus, Austin (husband)
- Organizations
- PEN
Members
Reviews
Lists
Awards
You May Also Like
Associated Authors
Statistics
- Works
- 26
- Also by
- 24
- Members
- 394
- Popularity
- #61,534
- Rating
- 4.0
- Reviews
- 7
- ISBNs
- 48
- Languages
- 1
I wrote down lots of favorite poems to return to and read again, but a few highlights were the anxiety/vulnerability of "Giving Birth," the heartbreak of "Emmett Till," the playfulness/wistfulness of "Thiefheart."
What people talk about when they call poetry powerful.… (more)