Richard McCann is a writer of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. He lives in Washington, D.C., where he is a long-time professor in the MFA Program in Creative Writing at American University

A gay writer, he is the author of Mother of Sorrows, a collection of linked stories that novelist Michael Cunningham

Michael Cunningham

Michael Cunningham is an American writer, best known for his 1998 novel The Hours, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the PEN/Faulkner Award in 1999.-Early life and education:...

 has described as unbearably beautiful. It won the 2005 John C. Zacharis First Book Award from Ploughshares

Ploughshares

Ploughshares is an American literary magazine founded in 1971 by DeWitt Henry and Peter O'Malley in The Plough and Stars, an Irish pub in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Since 1989, Ploughshares has been based at Emerson College in the heart of Boston...

and was also an American Library Association Stonewall Book Award

Stonewall Book Award

Sponsored by the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Round Table of the American Library Association , the Stonewall Book Award is for LGBT books...

 recipient, as well as a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award

Lambda Literary Award

Lambda Literary Awards are awarded yearly by the US-based Lambda Literary Foundation to published works which celebrate or explore LGBT themes. Categories include Humor, Romance and Biography. To qualify, a book must have been published in the United States in the year current to the award...

. Amazon named it one of the Top 50 Books of 2005.

McCann's book of poems, Ghost Letters, won the 1994 Beatrice Hawley

Beatrice Hawley Award

The Beatrice Hawley Award is given annually by Alice James Books. The award includes publication of a book-length poetry manuscript and a cash prize ....

 and Capricorn Poetry awards. With Michael Klein, he edited Things Shaped in Passing: More 'Poets for Life' Writing from the AIDS Pandemic. His stories, poems, and essays have appeared in The Atlantic

The Atlantic Monthly

The Atlantic is an American magazine founded in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1857. It was created as a literary and cultural commentary magazine. It quickly achieved a national reputation, which it held for more than a century. It was important for recognizing and publishing new writers and poets,...

," Esquire

Esquire (magazine)

Esquire is a men's magazine, published in the U.S. by the Hearst Corporation. Founded in 1932, it flourished during the Great Depression under the guidance of founder and editor Arnold Gingrich.-History:...

, Ms.

Ms. magazine

Ms. is an American feminist magazine co-founded by American feminist and activist Gloria Steinem and founding editor Letty Cottin Pogrebin together with founding editors Patricia Carbine, Joanne Edgar, Nina Finkelstein, and Mary Peacock, that first appeared in 1971 as an insert in New York magazine...

, Tin House

Tin House

Tin House is an American literary magazine and book publisher based in Portland, Oregon and New York City. The Tin House magazine was conceived in the summer of 1998 by Portland publisher Win McCormack. He envisioned a journal that would be graphically appealing and free of the stale substance...

, Ploughshares

Ploughshares

Ploughshares is an American literary magazine founded in 1971 by DeWitt Henry and Peter O'Malley in The Plough and Stars, an Irish pub in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Since 1989, Ploughshares has been based at Emerson College in the heart of Boston...

, and numerous anthologies, including The O. Henry Prize Stories 2007, Best American Essays 2000, and The Penguin Book of Gay Short Stories. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim

John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation

The John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation was founded in 1925 by Mr. and Mrs. Simon Guggenheim in memory of their son, who died April 26, 1922...

 and Rockefeller

Rockefeller Foundation

The Rockefeller Foundation is a prominent philanthropic organization and private foundation based at 420 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The preeminent institution established by the six-generation Rockefeller family, it was founded by John D. Rockefeller , along with his son John D. Rockefeller, Jr...

 foundations and the Yaddo Corporation

Yaddo

Yaddo is an artists' community located on a 400 acre estate in Saratoga Springs, New York. Its mission is "to nurture the creative process by providing an opportunity for artists to work without interruption in a supportive environment."...

. In 2010, he was the Master Artist at The Atlantic Center for the Arts in New Smyrna Beach, FL.

McCann has long been associated with the town of Provincetown, Massachusetts

Provincetown, Massachusetts

Provincetown is a New England town located at the extreme tip of Cape Cod in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 3,431 at the 2000 census, with an estimated 2007 population of 3,174...

, where he has lived on and off since the 1970s and where he has served on the Board of Trustees of the Fine Arts Work Center. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of the PEN/Faulkner Foundation

PEN/Faulkner Foundation

PEN/Faulkner Foundation is an independent charitable arts foundation which supports the art of writing and encourages readers of all ages...

 in Washington, D.C. and is a Member of the Corporation of Yaddo

Yaddo

Yaddo is an artists' community located on a 400 acre estate in Saratoga Springs, New York. Its mission is "to nurture the creative process by providing an opportunity for artists to work without interruption in a supportive environment."...

in Saratoga Springs, NY.

External links

• RichardMcCann.net
• "All Things Considered" NPR interview
• MFA Creative Writing program at American University
• McCann's French publisher
• McCann's Italian publisher