Scott Cairns

Scott Clifford Cairns (born 1954 in Tacoma, Washington) is an American poet, memoirist, librettist, and essayist.

Cairns earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Western Washington University (1977), a Master of Arts degree from Hollins University (1979), a Master of Fine Arts degree from Bowling Green State University (1981), and a PhD from the University of Utah (1990).

Cairns has served on the faculties of Kansas State University, Westminster College, University of North Texas, Old Dominion University.

He recently retired as Curators' Distinguished Professor of English at the University of Missouri.

While at North Texas, Cairns had served as editor of the American Literary Review.

He was founding director of Writing Workshops in Greece, an annual, 4-week workshop during the month of June, located on the island of Thasos.

1. A Directory of American Poets and Fiction Writers, editions 1985 through 2002, New York: Poets & Writers

6. Who's Who in the South and Southwest; 23rd edition, 1993–1994, New Providence, NJ: Marquis Who's Who, 1993

Inline citations

3. Contemporary Authors, A bio-bibliographical guide to current writers in fiction, general nonfiction, poetry, journalism, drama, motion pictures, television, and other fields; Volume 146, Detroit: Gale Research, 1995

4. Contemporary Authors, New Revision Series.

Cairns's poems have appeared in journals including The Atlantic Monthly, The Paris Review, The New Republic, Image, and Poetry, and have been anthologized in Upholding Mystery (Oxford University Press, 1996), Best Spiritual Writing (Harper Collins, 1998 and 2000), and Best American Spiritual Writing (Houghton Mifflin, 2004, 2005, and 2006).

He is married to Marcia Lane Vanderlip and they have two children, Benjamin V. Cairns and Elizabeth V. Cairns-Callen.

He has a brother, Steve Cairns, who currently resides in Hong Kong, teaching at an International School.

Bibliography

General references (biographical)

It won the inaugural National Outdoor Book Award (Outdoor Literature category) in 1997.

He wrote the libretto for "The Martyrdom of Saint Polycarp", an oratorio composed by JAC Redford, and the libretto for "A Melancholy Beauty", an oratorio composed by Georgi Andreev.

5. The Writers Directory, editions 13 through 23 (1998–2007), Detroit: St. James Press, 1999

A bio-bibliographical guide to current writers in fiction, general nonfiction, poetry, journalism, drama, motion pictures, television, and other fields; Volume 91, Detroit: Gale Group, 2000

2. Biography Index, A cumulative index to biographical material in books and magazines; Volume 28: September 2002 — August 2003, New York: H.W. Wilson Co., 2003

Since 2015, he has also served on the poetry faculty of the Seattle Pacific University low-residency MFA program in creative writing, and currently serves as that program's director.

With Carolyn Forché and Ilya Kaminsky, he also directs Mystikós: A Writers Retreat in Greece.

Cairns is the author of eleven collections of poetry, one collection of translations of Christian mystics, one spiritual memoir (now translated into Greek and Romanian), a book-length essay on suffering (now translated into Greek), and co-edited The Sacred Place with Scott Olsen, an anthology of poetry, fiction and nonfiction.