Michael Dennis Browne

In 2007, poet Michael Dennis Browne was named the Kilian McDonnell Writer-in-Residence. He is Professor Emeritus and former director of the program in creative writing at the University of Minnesota.

His fifth collection of poetry, Selected Poems 1965-1995, published by Carnegie Mellon University Press, won the Minnesota Book Award for poetry in 1998. His previous book, You Won’t Remember This, won a Minnesota Book Award in 1993.

As a librettist, he has written many texts set to music, working principally with composers Stephen Paulus and John Foley S.J. The Three Hermits, a church opera by Paulus and Browne, was performed in the Great Hall at Saint. John’s in April of 2007. His collaboration with Stephen Paulus, the post-Holocaust oratorio To be Certain of the Dawn, was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in music by the Minnesota Orchestra in 2006 and was performed again and recorded by them in 2008. It also was performed at Saint Cloud State and in the Abbey Church at Saint John’s in April of 2008.

Browne’s poems have been published in many magazines and anthologies, and his awards include fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Bush Foundation, the Jerome Foundation, and the McKnight Foundation.

His list of publications include:

• Give Her the River (Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2004), a picture book with paintings by Wendell Minor.
• Things I Can’t Tell You (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2005)
• My James Wright and Other Essays (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2008)
• What the Poem Wants: Prose on Poetry (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2008)
• The Turning of the Stones (Self-Published, PMN Press, 2010)

Michael has also provided outstanding leadership for the Institute writing workshop, “Believing in Writing: Poetry, Prose, and Prayer.”

Michael is married to Lisa McLean and they have three children: Peter, Mary and Nellie. To learn more about Michael and his work, please visit his website.