Camille Dungy has been named the 13th recipient of the Paul Engle Prize, presented by the Iowa City UNESCO City of Literature organization. Dungy will receive the prize at a ceremony at the Coralville Public Library on Thursday, Nov. 14, at 7 p.m. Following the ceremony Dungy will speak about her work and experiences. A reception will follow with books available for sale from Prairie Lights Book Store. This event is free and open to the public.
The prize, established in 2011, honors an individual who, like Paul Engle, represents a pioneering spirit in the world of literature through writing, editing, publishing, or teaching, and whose active participation in the larger issues of the day has contributed to the betterment of the world through the literary arts.
Dungy is a University Distinguished Professor at Colorado State University who has been honored with several awards over the course of her career, including the 2021 Academy of American Poets Fellowship, a 2019 Guggenheim Fellowship, an American Book Award, and fellowships from the NEA in both prose and poetry.
In her work she addresses issues around ecology and environmentalism, motherhood and race. Her books include 2023's Soil: The Story of a Black Mother's Garden, and Guidebook to Relative Strangers: Journeys into Race, Motherhood, and History, which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. She also has four collections of poetry, including Trophic Cascade, winner of the Colorado Book Award. She edited Black Nature: Four Centuries of African American Nature Poetry, the first anthology to bring African American environmental poetry to national attention.
She is poetry editor for Orion magazine, and hosts "Immaterial," a podcast from the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Magnificent Noise that explores the materials used in the creation of works of art.
Dungy said she was honored to be selected for this year's prize, particularly given her ties to Iowa City. She graduated from West High School, and her parents had long affiliations with the University of Iowa.
The Paul Engle Prize is made possible through the generous support of the City of Coralville.