Randall Mann

Randall Mann (born January 21, 1972) is an American poet.

Life and career[]

Born in Provo, Utah, the only son of Olympic Track and Field medalist Ralph Mann, Mann grew up in Kentucky and Florida, and earned a BA and an MFA from the University of Florida.^[1] Since 1998, he has lived in San Francisco.

Publications and critical reception[]

Mann's poems have appeared in numerous periodicals—including The Kenyon Review, The New Republic, The Paris Review, Poetry, and The Washington Post—and he has published four full-length poetry collections. His first collection, Complaint in the Garden, published by Zoo Press in 2004, won the 2003 Kenyon Review Prize in Poetry.^[2] Mann's next collection, Breakfast with Thom Gunn, published by the University of Chicago Press in 2009, was praised by the Los Angeles Times: "craft and bravura mix well" and "the clarity startles."^[3] The book was named a finalist for the California Book Award^[4] and the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Poetry.^[5] Mann's next two collections were published by Persea Books. Straight Razor, published in 2013, was described by the Los Angeles Times as full of "breathtaking honesty,"^[6] and was named a best poetry book of the year by the Kansas City Star^[7] and a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award.^[8] Proprietary, published in 2017, was a finalist for the 2018 Lambda Literary Award^[9] and the Northern California Book Award.^[10] In a review of Proprietary, Tess Taylor on NPR's All Things Considered said that "Mann imagines anew what it means to connect or to feel at a loss in the age of the Internet";^[11] Nathan Blansett in The Kenyon Review wrote that "Proprietary shows Mann at his most incisive";^[12] and Walter Holland, writing in Lambda Literary, wrote "Mann's work should be admired for its ferocity, its craft, and its unabashedly gay point of view."^[13]

Mann is also the co-author of the textbook Writing Poems, Seventh Edition, published by Pearson Longman in 2007.

Honors and awards[]

In 2004, Mann was named to the OUT 100 list by OUT Magazine.^[14] He was named a Laureate of the San Francisco Public Library in 2010.^[15] In 2013, he received the J. Howard and Barbara M. J. Wood Prize from Poetry Magazine.^[16]

Published works[]

Poetry collections[]

A Better Life. Persea Books, 2021. ISBN 978-0892555314.

Proprietary. Persea Books, 2017. ISBN 978-0892554812.

Straight Razor. Persea Books, 2013. ISBN 978-0892554300.

Breakfast with Thom Gunn. University of Chicago Press, 2009. ISBN 978-0226503448.

Complaint in the Garden. Zoo Press, 2004. ISBN 978-1932023121.

Co-authored book[]

Writing Poems, Seventh Edition. With Michelle Boisseau & Robert Wallace. Pearson Longman, 2007. ISBN 978-0321474063.

References[]

External links[]

• Randall Mann at the Poetry Foundation
• Randall Mann at the Academy of American Poets
• Interview, The Adroit Journal
• Interview, Literary Hub
• Interview, 32 Poems