US Poet Tess Gallagher 1943

Tess Gallagher (born 21 July 1943 in Port Angeles, Washington) is an American poet, essayist, author and playwright. She attended the University of Washington, where she studied creative writing with Theodore Roethke and later Nelson Bentley as well as David Wagoner and Mark Strand. Her honors include a fellowship from the Guggenheim Foundation, two National Endowment for the Arts awards, the The Maxine Cushing Gray Endowed Libraries Visiting Writers Fellowship (University of Washington), and the Elliston Award for "best book of poetry published by a small press" for the collection Instructions to the Double (1976).

Her third husband Raymond Carver encouraged her to write short stories, some of which were collected in The Lover of Horses (1987) and At the Owl Woman Saloon (1996).

Her book Moon Crossing Bridge is a collection of poems written after the death of Raymond Carver, who died from cancer in 1988. Her newest collection, Dear Ghosts, is her follow-up collection, written 14 years later.

Gallagher has taught at many colleges, most recently at Bucknell University and Whitman College. She recently published an essay in The Sun Magazine titled "Instead of Dying" about alcoholism and Raymond Carver's having maintained his sobriety. The essay was initially delivered at the Welsh Academy.

Distant Rain, published in 2006, is a conversation between Tess and Jakuchō Setouchi, a Buddhist nun from Kyoto, which took place after the death of Raymond Carver.

Tess Gallagher
Born	July 21, 1943 (1943-07-21) (age 67) Port Angeles, Washington
Education	University of Washington
Notable award(s)	Guggenheim Fellowship (1978) Two National Endowment for the Arts awards Maxine Cushing Gray Foundation Award Elliston Award
Spouse(s)	Raymond Carver

Poetry

• Stepping Outside Penumbra Press, 1974 (Chapbook)
• Instructions To The Double Graywolf Press, 1976
• Under Stars Graywolf Press, 1978,
• Willingly Graywolf Press, 1984,
• The Hug (1984)
• Amplitude Graywolf Press, 1987,
• Moon Crossing Bridge Graywolf Press, 1992,
• I Stop Writing the Poem (1992)
• Portable Kisses Capra Press, 1992,
• My Black Horse Bloodaxe, 1995,
• Dear Ghosts, Graywolf Press, 2006, —Poetry Finalist for 2007 Washington State Book Award

Fiction

• The Lover of Horses Harper & Row, 1986,
• At The Owl Woman Saloon Scribner, 1997, ; Simon & Schuster, 1999,
• The man from Kinvara: selected stories, Graywolf Press, 2009,

Essay collections

• A concert of tenses: essays on poetry University of Michigan Press, 1986,
• Soul Barnacles University of Michigan Press, 2003,

Other works

• "Dostoevsky: A Screenplay" & "King Dog a Screenplay" (Capra Back-to-Back Series) with Raymond Carver (Paperback - Dec. 1985)
• Words Like Distant Rain (2006)