News Release

Contact: Ryan Blum
303/ 629-1166 ph
303/ 629-9717 fx
ryan.blum@westaf.org
www.westaf.org

For Release on May 29, 2001 or Thereafter

WESTAF Announces Winners of Western States Book Awards, Recognizes Western Writers and Publishers

Denver, CO - WESTAF, the Western States Arts Federation (WESTAF), has announced the winners of its 2000 Western States Book Awards in the categories of poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction. Founded in 1984, the Awards are designed to recognize and promote writers of exceptional merit living in the West and published during the previous year by presses that have their principal offices in the region.

Peter Sears has won the poetry award for his book The Brink, published by Gibbs Smith Publisher. The fiction award has been given to Gerald Haslam for his novel Straight White Male, published by University of Nevada Press. The prize for creative nonfiction was awarded to Ralph Beer for In these Hills, published by Bangtail Press. Bill Porter, who publishes his translations under the name of Red Pine, has won the translation award for his book The Collected Songs of Cold Mountain, published by Copper Canyon Press. Jurors for the awards were Alison Hawthorne Deming, Floyd Salas, and Primus St. John.

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In The Brink, the author explores the concepts of identity and perspective through a range of personas. The judges noted that, "Nothing is predictable, but everything is warm, exciting, insightful, and humane. . . . When he steps into a life, regardless of its age or gender, he does so with respect and acuity for its lessons." Sears is the author of three other books: Secret Writing; Tour, New & Selected Poems; and I'm Gonna Bake Me a Rainbow Poem. In addition, his poetry has been published in numerous literary magazines and can be found in several anthologies. The author is a resident of Corvallis, Oregon.

Set in Haslam's native California, Straight White Male is a compelling narrative in which Leroy Upton (the protagonist) must reconcile himself to the intimate and disturbing complexities of his life: his spouse, his family, and himself. The judges felt that "the author creates a deeply personal story . . . in which forgiveness radiates from the soul of the protagonist to someplace deep within the reader." Gerald Haslam is the author of eight collections of short fiction and six works of nonfiction. He lives in Penngrove, California.

Ralph Beer's In these Hills is a collection of essays taken from his contributions to Big Sky Journal. For nearly two decades, Beer worked for his family's cattle business, and offers his readers an authentic and intimate sense of his life as a Montana cattleman. The judges felt that "Anyone who wants to know what it was to struggle with one's hands and heart to keep faith with a rugged place will find no more eloquent testimony." Ralph Beer is the author of a Spur Award winning novel, The Blind Corral, has been a featured columnist in Big Sky Journal, and was a contributing editor to Harper's Magazine. He is a former resident of Bozeman, Montana.

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The Collected Songs of Cold Mountain is an expanded and newly translated bilingual edition of the poetry of Han Shan ("Cold Mountain"). Han Shan, the Buddhist hermit who lived twelve hundred years ago in China's Tientai Mountains, left an indelible mark on Chinese literature and Zen. The judges felt that this was "an exquisite publication . . . in the poet's vision and spirit, in the precision and balance of the translator's scholarship and heart, and in the elegant wilderness of the bookmaker's art around them." Bill Porter has written one novel—Road to Heaven: Encounters with Chinese Hermits—and made several translations from the Chinese: Taoteching, The Zen Teachings of Bodhidharma, Guide to Capturing a Plum Blossom, The Zen Works of Stone House, and The Clouds Should Know Me by Now: Buddhist Poet Monks of China. Currently, Porter resides in Port Townsend, Washington.

The Western States Book Awards are sponsored by the Western States Arts Federation (WESTAF). WESTAF is dedicated to the creative advancement and preservation of the arts. The organization is currently engaged in projects centered on arts-policy research, information-systems development, and the convening of arts experts and leaders to address critical issues in the arts. For additional information, please visit the WESTAF Web site at www.westaf.org. Additional support for the Book Awards comes from the Witter Bynner Foundation for Poetry and the National Endowment for the Arts.