Gary Fincke

Gary Fincke is a poet and author of short fiction and nonfiction. Born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Fincke earned his BA from Thiel College, his MA from Miami University, and his PhD from Kent State University in 1974. He began his literary career that same year and has published over 20 works.

Fincke is the recipient of multiple awards for his poetry, including the Bess Hokin Prize from Poetry magazine and the Rose Lefcowitz Prize from Poet Lore. His collection Writing Letters for the Blind (2003) won the 2003 Ohio State University Press/The Journal poetry prize.

His prose work has also earned him various honors, including the Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction in 2003, a PEN Syndicated Fiction Prize, a George Garrett Fiction Prize, a Lewis Prize for Nonfiction, and two Pushcart Prizes, among others. In a review of Fincke’s memoir, The Canals of Mars, for Pank magazine, Salvatore Pane noted Fincke’s “laser-accurate observations” and “keen sense of rhythm and metaphor.”

Fincke is Degenstein Professor of Creative Writing Emeritus at Susquehanna University where he directed the Writers Insitute. He lives with his wife Elizabeth in Selinsgrove, PA.