Poet and editor Elise Paschen was born and raised in Chicago. She earned a BA at Harvard University, where she won the Lloyd McKim Garrison Medal and the Joan Grey Untermeyer Poetry Prize, and went on to receive a PhD in 20th century British and American Literature at Oxford University with a dissertation on the manuscripts of poet William Butler Yeats. During her time at Oxford she also co-founded Oxford Poetry.
Paschen has published several collections of poetry, including Bestiary (2009) and Infidelities (1996). She is the editor of Poetry Speaks Who I Am (2010) and Poetry Speaks to Children (2005), and the co-editor of Poetry Speaks (2001) and Poetry in Motion (1996). Her own work has been included in the anthologies Poetry 180: A Turning Back to Poetry (2003), The Poetry Anthology: 1912-2002 (2002), Reinventing the Enemy’s Language: Contemporary Native Women’s Writings of North America (1998), and A Formal Feeling Comes: Poems in Form by Contemporary Women (1994).
Paschen has served as the executive director of the Poetry Society of America. She co-founded the Poetry In Motion program, which posts poems in subways and buses. She has been the Frances Allen Fellow of the Newberry Library as well as poet laureate of Three Oaks, Michigan. Paschen lives with her family in Chicago.
Contributions to Humans & Nature:
- From Bestiary
A City Creatures blog post.
Noteworthy Links:
- Bestiary
A collection of poetry by Elise Paschen.
