POET

Barbara Ras (1949 - )

BIOGRAPHY

Barbara Ras was born in New Bedford, Massachusetts and has lived in Costa Rica, Colombia, and Athens, Georgia. She is the author of One Hidden Stuff (Penguin 2006) and of Bite Every Sorrow (Louisiana State University Press 1998), which was selected by C.K. Williams for the Walt Whitman Award.

Of Bite Every Sorrow, C.K. Williams writes: “the book is a demonstration of what might be called a morality of inclusiveness, a Whitmanesque commitment to the wisdom of the individual case rather than the general type. And along with so much rich soul-work, there is a remarkable poetic skill. Ras structures poems with a zaniness and an unpredictable cunning, and her verbal expertise and lucidity are as bright and surprising as her knowledge of the world is profound.”

Ras’ third book, The Last Skin, will be published by Penguin in 2010. She is the recipient of numerous awards including the Kate Tufts Discovery Award and a Guggenheim fellowship.

Ras has worked as a Senior Acquisitions Editor for the University of Georgia Press in Athens, and has taught at the Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers. Currently she directs the Trinity University Press in San Antonio, Texas.