Garrett Hongo

Garrett Hongo studied at Pomona College and University of California, Irvine. The recorded working language is English. The field of work recorded is poetry and Asian-American literature. Residence is recorded at Eugene. Employment is recorded with University of Oregon. Work by Garrett Hongo is recorded in the collections of Oregon Poetry Collection. Distinctions recorded are Guggenheim Fellowship and National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship.

• Name — Garrett Hongo • Born — 30 May 1951 • Birthplace — Volcano, Hawai'i, U.S. • Education — Pomona College University of Michigan (BA) University of California, Irvine (MFA) • Occupation — poet • Notable Works — The River of Heaven Volcano: A Memoir of Hawaii • Children — 2 • Awards — Pulitzer finalist; Oregon Book Award; Guggenheim Fellow, NEA Fellowship, Rockefeller Fellowship

Hongo was born in Volcano, Hawai'i. He attended Pomona College and the University of Michigan, and received a Master of Fine Arts degree in English from the University of California at Irvine. Hongo has been awarded fellowships from the Watson Foundation, the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Rockefeller Foundation.

Hongo is a professor of creative writing at the University of Oregon. From 1989 through 1993, he was the director of the university's Program in Creative Writing. Hongo has published three books of poetry. His first was Yellow Light (1982), and The River of Heaven (1988) was a Lamont Poetry Selection of the Academy of American Poets and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. Volcano: A Memoir of Hawai'i (1995) was awarded the 2006 Oregon Book Award for Literary Nonfiction. Hongo has also worked as an editor on Songs My Mother Taught Me: Stories, Plays and Memoir by Wakako Yamauchi (1994) and on The Open Boat: Poems from Asian America (1993). Hongo served as Guest Editor of Poem-a-Day in May 2025.

In a statistical overview derived from writings by and about Garett Hongo, OCLC/WorldCat includes roughly 30+ works in 70+ publications in two languages and 4,600+ library holdings. • The Buddha Bandits down Highway 99 (1978) • Yellow Light (University of California, Irvine, 1980; Wesleyan University Press, 1982) • The River of Heaven (Knopf, 1988; Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2001) • The Open boat: Poems from Asian America (1993) • Volcano: A Memoir of Hawaiʻi (1995) • Coral Road: Poems (2011) • The Mirror Diary: Selected Essays (University of Michigan Press, 2017) • The Perfect Sound: A Memoir in Stereo (2022) • Anthologies • "from Cruising 99", The geography of home: California's poetry of place, Editors Christopher Buckley, Gary Young, Heyday Books, 1999, • "Yellow Light", Bold words: a century of Asian American writing, Editors Rajini Srikanth, Esther Yae Iwanaga, Rutgers University Press, 2001, • "Kapu Tube", Hawaiʻi: true stories of the island spirit, Editors Rick Carroll, Marcie Carroll, Travelers' Tales, 1999, • "Something Whispered in the Shakuhachi", What book!?: Buddha poems from beat to hiphop, Editor Gary Gach, Parallax Press, 1997, • Unsettling America: an anthology of contemporary multicultural poetry, Editors Maria M. Gillan, Jennifer Gillan, Penguin Books, 1994,