Lucia Perillo

James Rudy

Lucia Perillo grew up in the suburbs of New York City in the 1960s. She graduated from McGill University in Montreal in 1979 with a major in wildlife management and subsequently worked for the US Fish and Wildlife Service. She completed her MA in English at Syracuse University while working seasonally at Mount Rainier National Park, and moved to Olympia, WA,  in 1987, where she taught at Saint Martin’s University. For most of the 1990s, Perillo taught in the creative writing program at Southern Illinois University. She passed away in 2016.

Awards and Honors

Notable Book of 2012, The New York Times Book Review

Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Award for Poetry

Finalist, National Book Critics Circle Award

Finalist, Pulitzer Prize

Washington State Book Award

Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry

Finalist, Los Angeles Times Book Prize

Kingsley Tufts Award

MacArthur Foundation Fellowship

Kate Tufts Discovery Award

PEN/Revson Award

Norma Farber First Book Award, Poetry Society of America