Thomas Devaney is poet, teacher, and critic. He is the author of A Series of Small Boxes (Fish Drum, 2007), Letters to Ernesto Neto (Germ Folios, 2005), and The American Pragmatist Fell in Love (Banshee Press, 1999).
Devaney is a Senior Writing Fellow in the Critical Writing Program, English Department at the University of Pennsylvania. In 2003 he began teaching in the Creative Writing Program and has taught in the Critical Writing Program at Penn full-time since 2005. In 2008 he was awarded a Distinguished Teaching Award from the Critical Writing Program. In 2008 he edited and published a student essay collection, The Art of the Box Lunch, in collaboration with Penn's Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Devaney is also currently a Visiting Assistant Professor in poetry at Haverford College (2008-2010).
In 2001 Devaney joined the Kelly Writers House, Penn's literary hub, for an active four years as program coordinator and producer of the monthly radio program "Live at the Writers House" on 88.5-FM WXPN. He received his MFA in Creative Writing at Brooklyn College, CUNY in 1998, where he was a student of Allen Ginsberg and L.S. Asekoff.
Devaney's poems have been published in The American Poetry Review, jubliat, Fence, Jacket, and online at PennSound. Anthologies include A Best of FENCE: The First Nine Years (FENCE Books, 2009), POEM: Poets On (an) Exchange Mission (Fish Drum/Double Change, 2009 bilingual French-English edition), Walt Whitman, Hom(m)age, 2005/1855 (Turtle Point Press and Editions Joca Seria, 2005) and American Poetry: The Next Generation (Carnegie Mellon, 2000).
In 2009 he was awarded a summer residency at the Camargo Foundation in Cassis, France by the French American Cultural Exchange (FACE). He was a Fellow at The MacDowell Colony in 2006.
Devaney writes criticism on twentieth century and contemporary poetry. He has also written on the Objectivist poet Carl Rakosi. In 2008 he edited a feature issue of Jacket Magazine on the poet George Oppen. His reviews and essays have been published in The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Poetry Project Newsletter, Jacket, The Boston Review, and Rain Taxi.
Projects with the Philadelphia Institute of Contemporary Art include a student performance "New Invisible Cities," for "The Puppet Show" exhibition (2008); a performance, "No Silence Here, Enjoy the Silence," for the "Locally Localized Gravity" exhibit (2007); "Tales from the 215" for the "Philadelphia Freedom" exhibit with Zoe Strauss (2006); a collaboration with Troy Brauntuch for the "Springtide" exhibit (2005); and a two week performance "The Empty House" at the Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site for "The Big Nothing" exhibit (2004). Other projects include collaborations with the Philadelphia Museum of Art, LURE Projects, and The Lost Art of Puppet Theater.
For current updates, check Thomas Devaney's blog at thomasdevaney.blogspot.com.
Photo by Zoe Strauss