Suzanne Buffam

Suzanne Buffam was born in Montreal and raised in Vancouver, British Columbia. She earned an MA in English literature from Concordia University in Montreal, and an MFA in poetry from the Iowa Writers' Workshop. She is the author of three collections of poetry, most recently A Pillow Book, which was named one of the ten Best Poetry Books of 2016 by The New York Times. Her other books are The Irrationalist, a finalist for the 2011 Griffin Poetry Prize, and Past Imperfect, winner of Canada’s 2006 Gerald Lampert Award. Her work has been supported by fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Jeannette Heian Ballard Writers’ Trust, and the Canada Council for the Arts. She has taught Creative Writing at the Iowa Writers' Workshop, the University of Chicago, and Columbia College Chicago, and frequently serves as a mentor in the University of Guelph's MFA Summer Mentorship Program in Guelph, Ontario. She has lived in Chicago since 2003.