Ilya Kaminsky Biography

Ilya Kaminsky (born April 18, 1977 in Odessa, Soviet Union, now Ukraine) is a Ukrainian born Russian-Jewish-American poet, critic, translator and professor. He began to write poetry seriously as a teenager in Odessa, publishing a chapbook in Russian entitled The Blessed City. His first published poetry collection in English was a chapbook, Musica Humana (Chapiteau Press, 2002). His second collection in English, Dancing in Odessa (Tupelo Press, 2004), earned him a 2005 Whiting Award, the American Academy of Arts and Letters Metcalf Award, the Ruth Lilly Fellowship, and the Dorset Prize, and was named the 2005 ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year in Poetry. In 2008, he was awarded a Lannan Literary Fellowship. His poems have appeared in literary journals and magazines including The Kenyon Review, New Republic, Harvard Review, Poetry.
Kaminsky was born in Odessa, former Soviet Union (now Ukraine), on April 18, 1977. According to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, "Kaminsky lost most of his hearing at age 4. He lost his homeland at age 16, when family sought political asylum." At the time, he spoke no English, and continued to write in Russian while learning English.

Kaminsky earned his Bachelor of Arts at Georgetown University, and went on to receive his J.D. from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. He has been invited to teach and read poetry at literary centers, colleges and universities from Harvard to Naropa. He has also worked as a Law Clerk at the National Immigration Law Center, and more recently, at Bay Area Legal Aid, helping the poor and homeless to solve their legal difficulties. He currently teaches in the graduate creative writing program at San Diego State University, and lives in San Diego with his wife, Katie Farris.