Quan Barry

Amy Quan Barry was born in Saigon and grew up in Boston. A poet and novelist, she holds an MFA from the University of Michigan.

Barry is the author of four books of poetry, including Loose Strife (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2015); Water Puppets (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2011), winner of the AWP Donald Hall Prize for Poetry and a PEN Open Book Award finalist; and Asylum (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2001), winner of the Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize.

Barry is also the author of four books of fiction: The Unveiling (Grove, 2025); When I’m Gone, Look for Me in the East (Vintage, 2023); We Ride Upon Sticks (Penguin, 2020); and She Weeps Each Time You’re Born (Pantheon, 2015). Also a playwright who is a member of the Dramatists Guild, she is the author of six plays, including The Mytilenean Debate, which premiered in 2022.

Barry is the recipient of two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, in both poetry and fiction. She has also been awarded fellowships from Stanford University, The Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, and the Wisconsin Arts Board. 

Barry is the Lorraine Hansberry Professor of English at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. She lives in Wisconsin.