E. Ethelbert Miller Explained

E. Ethelbert Miller
Birth Name:	Eugene Ethelbert Miller
Birth Date:	20 November 1950
Birth Place:	Bronx, New York, U.S.
Occupation:	Professor, poet, literary activist
Language:	English
Alma Mater:	Howard University
Genre:	Poetry; memoir

Eugene Ethelbert Miller (born November 20, 1950) is an African-American poet, teacher and literary activist, based in Washington, DC.^{[1] [2]} He is the author of several collections of poetry and two memoirs, the editor of Poet Lore magazine, and the host of the weekly WPFW morning radio show On the Margin.^[3]

Life and career

Miller was born in the Bronx, New York.^[4] He received his B.A. from Howard University.^[5] He is the author of 13 books of poetry, two memoirs and is the editor of three poetry anthologies. His work has appeared in numerous publications, including Beltway Poetry Quarterly, Poet Lore, and Sojourners.

Miller was the founder and director of the Ascension Poetry Reading Series, one of the oldest literary series in the Washington area. He was director of Howard University's African-American Resource Center from 1974 for more than 40 years.^{[6] [7]} Miller has taught at various schools, including American University, Emory & Henry College, George Mason University, Harpeth Hall School and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He was also a core faculty member of the writing seminars at Bennington College. He worked with Operation Homecoming for the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH).^[8]

He currently serves as board chairperson of the Institute for Policy Studies.^[9] He is also on the boards of Split This Rock and the Writer's Center, and since 2002 has been co-editor of Poet Lore magazine, the oldest poetry journal in the US.^[10] He is former chair of the Humanities Council of Washington, D.C., and has served on the boards of the AWP, the Edmund Burke School, PEN American Center, PEN/Faulkner Foundation, and the Washington Area Lawyer for the Arts (WALA). He hosts a weekly morning radio show on WPFW called On the Margin.

In 1979, Marion Barry, the Mayor of Washington, D.C., where Miller lives, proclaimed September 28, 1979, as "E. Ethelbert Miller Day."^[11] Subsequently, on May 21, 2001, an "E. Ethelbert Miller Day" was also proclaimed by the Mayor of Jackson, Tennessee.^[12]

Miller's papers are held at Emory & Henry College and The George Washington University.^{[9] [13]}

Awards and honors

• 1979: September 28 proclaimed as "E. Ethelbert Miller Day" by the Mayor of Washington, D.C.
• 1982: Mayor's Art Award for Literature
• 1988: Received the Public Humanities Award from the D.C. Humanities Council^[14]
• 1993: Columbia Merit Award^[15]
• 1994: Made an Honorary Citizen of the city of Baltimore on July 17 by the Mayor of Baltimore^[16]
• 1994: PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award (for In Search of Color Everywhere)
• 1995: O. B. Hardison, Jr. Poetry Prize
• 1996: Honorary doctorate of literature awarded on May 18 by Emory & Henry College
• 1997: Stephen Henderson Poetry Award from the African American Literature and Culture Society
• 2001: May 21 declared as "E. Ethelbert Miller Day" by the Mayor of Jackson, Tennessee^[9]
• 2003: Fathering Words selected by DC WE READ for the one book, one city program sponsored by the D.C. Public Libraries
• 2003: Honored by First Lady Laura Bush at the White House
• 2004: Fulbright Scholarship recipient^[17]
• 2015: Inducted into the Washington, DC Hall of Fame^[18]
• 2016: AWP George Garrett Award for Outstanding Community Service in Literature and the DC Mayor's Arts Award for Distinguished Honor^[19]
• 2018: Inducted into Gamma Xi Phi, a fraternity for artists^[20]

Bibliography

Poetry

• "The Land of Smiles and the Land of No Smiles: A Poem." 1974.
• Book: Andromeda. Chiva Publications. 1974 .
• Book: The Migrant Worker. Washington Writers' Publishing House. 1978. 978-0-931846-07-6 .
• Book: Season of Hunger/Cry of Rain: Poems 1975-1980. Lotus Press. 1982. 978-0-916418-35-9 .
• Book: Where Are the Love Poems for Dictators?. Open Hand Publishing. 1986. 978-0-940880-65-8 .
• The Fire This Time: 1992 and Beyond Los Angeles (Heaven Chapbook series), White Fields Press, 1993.
• Book: First Light: New and Selected Poems. Black Classic Press. 1993. registration. 978-0-933121-81-2 .
• Book: Whispers, Secrets, and Promises. Black Classic Press. 1998. 978-1-57478-011-6 .
• Book: Buddha Weeping in Winter. Red Dragonfly Press. 2001. 978-1-890193-25-6 .
• Book: How We Sleep On the Nights We Don't Make Love. Curbstone Press. 2004. 978-1-931896-04-7 .
• The 10 Race Koans as presented to Charles Johnson on the Morning of July 13, 2008; Shonda in England; Thomas Jefferson said he saw you in Paris. DC Poets. October 31, 2008 .
• The Hooker Never Votes; Water Song; 2 Shorts and a Smoke. Delaware Poetry Review.
• Book: On Saturdays, I Santana With You. Curbstone Press. 2009. 978-1-931896-50-4 .
• The Collected Poems of E. Ethelbert Miller (ed. Kirsten Porter), Willow Books, 2016.
• If God Invented Baseball: Poems, Simon and Schuster, 2018.
• When Your Wife Has Tommy John Surgery and Other Baseball Stories, Simon and Schuster, 2021. ^[21]

Anthologies

• Book: Beyond the Frontier: African American Poetry for the 21st Century. Black Classic Press. 2002. 978-1-57478-017-8 .
• Book: In Search of Color Everywhere: A Collection of African American Poetry. E. Ethelbert Miller, Terrance Cummings. Stewart, Tabori & Chang. 1994. 978-1-55670-339-3.
• Book: Women Surviving Massacres and Men. Anemone Press. 1977.
• Book: Synergy, an Anthology of Washington D. C. Black Poetry . Ahmos Zu-Bolton II . Ahmos Zu-Bolton II . E. Ethelbert Miller. Energy Blacksouth Press. 1975 .
• Book: https://books.google.com/books?id=y0Gy4NIaHJAC&q=ethelbert+miller&pg=PA153. She Is Flat On Her Back. The Oxford Anthology of African-American Poetry . Arnold Rampersad . Arnold Rampersad . Hilary Herbold. Oxford University Press. 2006. 978-0-19-512563-4 .
• Jonathan Andersen, ed. (2008). Seeds of Fire: Contemporary Poetry from the Other U. S. A. Smokestack Books.

Memoirs

• Book: The 5th Inning. Busboys and Poets Press. 2009. 978-1-60486-062-7 .
• Book: Fathering Words: The Making of an African American Writer. St. Martin's Press. 2000. 978-0-312-27013-1 .

External links

• "Living the Legacy" – official website
• American Academy of Poets page
• Two Poems by Miller at Beltway Poetry Quarterly
• Audio interview with Grace Cavalieri
• "E. Ethelbert Miller", reverbiage, NPR
• "Poetry by E. Ethelbert Miller", On Being
• "E. Ethelbert Miller, Featured Writer", Writing For Peace, February 2020.
• "Talking With Poets: E. Ethelbert Miller, The Poet of Baseball and of Life". Interview with Indran Amirthanayagam. The Poetry Channel, July 12, 2021.
• E. Ethelbert Miller Receives 2022 Howard Zinn Lifetime Achievement Award, at HowardZinn.org.

Notes and References

1. Hayley Garrison Phillips, "Local Legend E. Ethelbert Miller Isn't Going Anywhere", Washingtonian, February 6, 2018.
2. Elizabeth Lund, "Poetry that explores love and aggression, baseball and the natural world", The Washington Post, March 9, 2018.
3. Grace Cavalieri, "Featured Poet E. Ethelbert Miller", 40th Anniversary "The Poet and the Poem".
4. http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/e-ethelbert-miller "E. Ethelbert Miller"
5. Web site: Honorary Board. June 9, 2020. The Writer's Center. en-US.
6. Web site: Department of Afro-American Studies, Howard University. . July 12, 2009 . July 8, 2009 . https://web.archive.org/web/20090708214827/http://www.coas.howard.edu/afroamerican/RecourceCenter.html . dead .
7. Courtland Milloy, "Outpouring of support for poet who says he was let go from Howard", The Washington Post, May 5, 2015.
8. http://arts.endow.gov/national/homecoming/authorbios/miller.html "E. Ethelbert Miller"
9. https://searcharchives.library.gwu.edu/repositories/2/resources/367 E. Ethelbert Miller Finding Aid
10. http://poetlore.com/about/ourstory/ "Our Story"
11. Web site: E. Ethelbert Miller's Biography. June 9, 2020. The HistoryMakers. en.
12. Web site: About E. Ethelbert Miller Academy of American Poets. June 9, 2020. Academy of American Poets.
13. Web site: Emory & Henry College Special Collections & Archives. . July 12, 2009 . https://web.archive.org/web/20080820232451/http://ehcweb.ehc.edu/archives/miller.html . August 20, 2008 . dead .
14. http://www.eethelbertmiller.com/biography.html "Biography"
15. Web site: April 26, 2019. E. Ethelbert Miller, Eugene Ethelbert Miller. June 9, 2020. The Black Names Project. en.
16. Web site: October 20, 2008. Award-Winning Writer E. Ethelbert Miller Speaks at MC on October 22. June 9, 2020. Montgomery College.
17. Web site: Krane. Scott. May 26, 2019. E. Ethelbert Miller: Jazz in Poetry. Jazz Times.
18. https://willowlit.net/the-collected-poems-of-e-ethelbert-miller/ E. Ethelbert Miller biography
19. http://www.beltwaypoetry.com/poetry/poets/names/miller-e-ethelbert/ "E. Ethelbert Miller"
20. http://gammaxiphi.com/2020/02/15/brother-e-ethelbert-miller-featured-in-dovetales "Brother E. Ethelbert Miller featured in DoveTales"
21. Book: When Your Wife Has Tommy John Surgery and Other Baseball Stories Poems. Simon & Schuster. 9781947951365. 31 May 2021. Ethelbert Miller. E.. 7 September 2021.