Matthew Dickman

Matthew Dickman was born on August 20, 1975 in Portland, Oregon. After studying at the University of Oregon, he earned an MFA from the University of Texas at Austin’s Michener Center.

Dickman is the author of Husbandry (W. W. Norton, 2022); Wonderland (W. W. Norton, 2018); Mayakovsky’s Revolver (W. W. Norton, 2012); and All-American Poem (American Poetry Review, 2008), winner of the 2008 American Poetry Review/ Honickman First Book Prize in Poetry. 

Dickman’s style, as exemplified in All-American Poem, was noted in the Los Angeles Times:

Dickman crystallizes and celebrates human contact, reminding us ... that our best memories, those most worth holding on to, those that might save us, will be memories of love ... The background, then, is a downbeat America resolutely of the moment; the style, though, looks back to the singing free verse of Walt Whitman and Frank O’Hara.

Dickman’s awards include the May Sarton Award from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Kate Tufts Award from Claremont College, and the 2009 Oregon Book Award. He is the recipient of two fellowships from Literary Arts of Oregon and has received residencies and fellowships from the Michener Center for Writers, Vermont Studio Center, Fine Arts Work Center, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the Lannan Foundation.

Dickman also appeared in the 2002 film Minority Report alongside his twin brother, poet Michael Dickman. Dickman has served as poetry editor at Tin House and teaches in Vermont College of Fine Arts’ low-residency MFA program. He lives in Portland, Oregon.