Biography

Rita Brady Kiefer’s most recently published poems have appeared in two anthologies, Face to Face (Farrar Straus & Giroux/North Point Press, 2004) and Hunger Enough: Living Spiritually in a Consumer Society (Pudding House Press, 2004). Numerous other poems have appeared in publications such as Ploughshares, The Connecticut Poetry Review, The Yalobusha Review, Kansas Quarterly, The Bloomsbury Review, Many Mountains Moving, The High Plains Literary Review, Cimarron Review, Southern Poetry Review, Southwest Review, etc. Her awards include a 2005 Puffin Foundation grant for My Name is Not Eve, a series of dramatic monologues in the voices of survivors of domestic violence - her teachers for the past twenty years during weekly writing sessions at local shelters; two fellowships from the Colorado Council on the Arts (2000, 1993); a writer’s fellowship at the Colorado Women’s Institute (1996-7); the Gert Stiemke Award (2003); Colorado Endowment for the Humanities grant (1987); Outstanding Women of Weld County Literary Arts Award (1994). She was named Distinguished Scholar (1993) for her literary achievements while a Professor of English at the University of Northern Colorado. Her books include Nesting Doll (University Press of Colorado, 1999), Trying on Faces (Monkshood Press, 1995), and Unveiling (Chicory Blue Press, 1993). Her work has been translated into Spanish and published in Argentina and Spain. One of her poems provided lyrics for a musical composition recorded on the CD Soundscapes: Music from Colorado and Beyond by the Ars Nova Group of Boulder.