Adrian Matejka

Adrian Matejka grew up in Indianapolis, Indiana and is a graduate of the MFA program at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. He is the author of "The Devil’s Garden" (Alice James Books, 2003) which won the New York / New England Award and "Mixology" (Penguin, 2009), a winner of the 2008 National Poetry Series. His third collection of poems, "The Big Smoke" (Penguin, 2013), was awarded the 2014 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and was a finalist for the 2013 National Book Award, 2014 Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, and 2014 Pulitzer Prize in poetry. "Map to the Stars" was published by Penguin in 2017. Among Matejka’s other honors are the Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Award and fellowships from the Academy of American Poets, Cave Canem, the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, and a Simon Fellowship from United States Artists. His mixed media collaboration with Nicholas Galanin and Kevin Neireiter inspired by Funkadelic, "Standing on the Verge & Maggot Brain" (Third Man Books) and a full-length collection of poems "Somebody Else Sold the World" (Penguin) were published in 2021. "Last On His Feet," a graphic novel illustrated by Youssef Daoudi about the boxer Jack Johnson was published by Liveright in February 2023. He lives in Chicago and is the editor of Poetry magazine.