Two Yaddo Writers Win Whiting Awards

Two Yaddo artists - poet Elizabeth Arnold and fiction writer Justin Cronin - are among the 10 recipients of the 2002 Whiting Writers' Awards, presented annually by the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation to "emerging writers of exceptional talent and promise."

Ms. Arnold is the author of The Reef, a book of poems published in 1999. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Slate, Chicago Review, Tikkun, and Antioch Review. She also is the editor and author of the afterward for Mina Loy's novel, Insel. Educated at Oberlin College, University of Chicago, and the Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers, Ms. Arnold also is the recipient of fellowships from the Bunting Institute, Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, and Bread Loaf Writer's Conference. She was a Yaddo guest artist in 1995 and is now assistant professor in the Department of English at the University of Maryland.

Mary and O'Neil, Mr. Cronin's debut work published in 2001, is a novel-in-stories about familial love and loss which won a 2001 PEN Hemingway Award. Mr. Cronin's work has appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer Magazine and in such literary journals as Epoch, Greensboro Review, Five Points, and Crescent Review. He is a graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and teaches at La Salle University. Mr. Cronin has been a Yaddo guest artist twice.

Now in its 18th year, the Whiting Writer's Awards program has honored 180 poets, fiction and nonfiction writers, and playwrights with grants totaling more than $5 million. The 2002 recipients were announced at a ceremony in New York City on Wednesday, October 30. Each of this year's recipients received $35,000.

In addition to Ms. Arnold and Mr. Cronin, the 2002 Whiting Writer's Award winners are Jeffrey Renard Allen, Kim Edwards, David Gewanter, Melissa James Gibson, Michelle Huneven, Danzy Senna, Evan Smith, and Joshua Weiner.