William S. Penn

William S. Penn (1949-) is a mixed race Nez Pierce author and English professor at Michigan State. His work explores the issues his father faced coming to terms with his Indian heritage. His work may be classified as magical realism. He has also written a nonfiction work, "All My Sins are Relatives" about his mixed-blood family life.

William S. Penn is an urban mixed-blood Nez Perce. Born and raised in the West, he has lived in many different regions of the United States, as well as in England. He was educated at the University of California at Davis and at Syracuse University. He has previously taught at the State University of New York at Oswego and at Hostos Community College in the South Bronx. Recently awarded the Distinguished Faculty Award by Michigan State University, he teaches courses in the oral tradition, comedy and cultural survival, the Literatures of the Americas, and creative writing.

Bill uses his writing to explore and reconcile his mixed ethnic heritage, writing fiction, essays and reviews. His works have been included in Antaeus, Missouri Review, Quarterly West, Stand, and Southern Humanities Review, Guest Editor for Callaloo.

He lives in East Lansing with his wife, Jennifer, and their two joys, Rachel Antonia and William Anthony. He is working on a new novel-in-five-essays titled, The Death of Consuela.

"I write to amuse and entertain, but I write from a center I take seriously, a center given to me by my grandfather, encouraged by my sisters, and nurtured by my wife and by my daughter and son with whom I tell stories. Indeed, All My Sins Are Relatives is dedicated 'For Grandfather, who knows / And Rachel and Willy, so they may.' Thus, I would say that much of my work is so they-- the children, not just my own--may know my attempt to bridge the gap between the urban mixblood and Euramerican worlds to which I belong."Awards

Bill was awarded the Stephen Crane Prize for Fiction at Syracuse University in 1977 and 1979. He received a Yaddo Fellowship to the Yaddo Writer's Colony to work on his novel, The Absence of Angels. He also received a supporting grant from the Ludwig Vogelstein Foundation, Inc. in 1985, an All University Research Initiation Grant from Michigan State University, a New York Foundation for the Arts Prize in 1988, and a Michigan Council on the Arts Grant in 1990 to help in completing this book.

In 1991, Bill was a Resident Writer at the Banff Center for the Arts. He received the North American Indian Prose Award from the University of Nebraska Press in 1994 for All My Sins Are Relatives and an All University Research Completion Grant from Michigan State University to complete the work. In 1996, All My Sins Are Relatives received the Critic's Choice Award for the Most Acclaimed Books of 1995-96.

Bill was named Native American Writer of the Year in Non-fiction by the Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers in 1997. In 1998, he was named Native American Editor of the Year by the same organization. His book The Telling of the World: Native American Stories and Art was named to the list of Best University Press Books of 2000, and he received the American Book Award for Literary Merit for Killing Time With Strangers.

Bill has recently received (in 2003) the Distinguished Faculty Award from Michigan State University. He was named a 2002 Wordcraft Circle Writer of the Year in Creative Prose: Fiction for Feathering Custer.Writing available online

from All My Sins Are Relatives

from Killing Time With Strangers

from This Is the WorldBooks by William S. PennFiction

The Absence of Angels, Univ. Oklahoma Press.

Killing Time with Strangers, Univ. Arizona Press.

This is the World, Michigan State Univ. Press.

* Publisher's page

The Telling of the World: Native American Stories and Art, as Editor, Stewart Tabori & Chang.Essays

All My Sins Are Relatives, Univ. Nebraska Press.

As We Are Now: Mixblood Essays on Race and Identity, as Editor and contributor, Univ. California Press.

* Publisher's page

Feathering Custer, Univ. Nebraska Press.Anthologies

I Tell You Now, Brian Swann (Editor), Univ. Nebraska Press.

The New Short Story Theories, Charles E. May (Editor), Ohio Univ. Press.Interviews

Interview with Jane Arnold in the Michigan Writers Series

Contemporary Authors, V. 145, 1995, Gale Research.

Interview with Elizabeth Sherwin from Printed Matter in The Davis (Calif.) Enterprise.See Also

Penn's faculty page at Michigan State University

Profile from Michigan State University Libraries

Penn receives the 2000 American Book Award for fiction

A short biography from the Internet Public Library's Native American Authors Project.

References

Kratzert, M. "Native American Literature: Expanding the Canon", Collection Building Vol. 17, 1, 1998, p. 4