Dr. Paul Brooke is a Professor and the Endowed Chair of Creative Writing at Grand View University in Des Moines, Iowa, where he teaches Advanced Creative Writing, Environmental Literature, Creative Photography, Experimental Photography, Fiction, Poetry Writing, Introduction to Nonfiction, Editing and Digital Publishing, Contemporary Literature, Diverse Voices, Novel Writing, Major Authors, and Literary Theory. He has won awards for outstanding advising, scholarship, and teaching while at Grand View University, plus granted two sabbaticals. His writing has been featured in such journals as Scientific American, North American Review, The Antioch Review, Latin American Literary Review, Rocky Mountain Review, International Poetry Review, Isotope: A Journal of Literary Nature and Science Writing, and the Interdisciplinary Study of Literature and the Environment. He was chosen for a residency at the Gullkistan Writing and Photography Residency in Iceland for 2018. His long poem, "The Skald and the Drukkin Tröllaukin," an interconnected series of Norse form poems, was selected second place and included in the 64 Best Poets of 2018. His work has won numerous awards including The Iowa Prize for Poetry (1999), two nominations for the Pushcart Prize (2014), a finalist selection for The Proverse International Poetry Prize (2020), an Iowa Artist Fellowship to write a book on pumas (2021), first prize for the Icelandic Poetry and Short Story contest from the Department of Icelandic Language and Literature at the University of Manitoba (2022), and an Iowa Arts Grant to complete two book projects (2024).Brooke has published eight books. Light and Matter: Photographs and Poems of Iowa, his first full-length collection, was published by Campbell & Lewis Publishers in 2008. Meditations on Egrets: Photographs and Poems of Sanibel Island was published 2010 and Sirens and Seriemas: Photographs and Poems of the Amazon and Brazil was published in 2015 by Brambleby Books. Arm Wrestling at the Iowa State Fair was released by Finishing Line Press in 2018. The Skald and the Drukkin Tröllaukin was published in 2022 and Pantagruelian: Photographs and Poems of Torres del Paine in 2024. Both are from Gold Wake Press. His latest book, The Cities of the Plains An Anthology of Artists and Poets, is due out in April 2024. He is the editor and designer of the collection that features 57 Iowa artists and poets.
