Jay Hopler

Jay Hopler was born on November 23, 1970, in San Juan, Puerto Rico. He received a BA from New York University, an MA from the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars, an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and a PhD in American Studies from Purdue University.

Hopler was the author of The Abridged History of Rainfall (McSweeney’s Poetry Series, 2016), a finalist for the 2016 National Book Award, and Green Squall (Yale University Press, 2006), chosen by Louise Glück for the 2006 Yale Series of Younger Poets. His other works are Still Life (McSweeney’s Publishing, 2022), a finalist for the 2023 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry; the translation project The Museum of Small Dark Things: 25 Poems by Georg Trakl (San Diego State University, 2017); Before the Door of God: An Anthology of Devotional Poetry (Yale University Press, 2013), edited with his spouse, Kimberly Johnson; and The Killing Spirit: An Anthology of Murder for Hire (Overlook Press, 1996).

Hopler’s honors and awards include a Whiting Writers’ Award and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters, as well as two Florida Book Awards.

Hopler was director of the creative writing program at the University of South Florida in Tampa. He died of prostate cancer at his home in Salt Lake City on June 15, 2022.