Mai Der Vang is the author of three collections of poetry. Her first collection, Afterland (Graywolf Press, 2017), received the First Book Award from the Academy of American Poets, was longlisted for the National Book Award in Poetry, and was a finalist for the Kate Tufts Discovery Award. Her second book, Yellow Rain (Graywolf Press, 2021), received the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize from the Academy of American Poets, an American Book Award, and a Northern California Book Award. Yellow Rain was also a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, PEN/Voelcker Award, the LA Times Book Prize, and the California Book Awards. Her most recent collection, Primordial (Graywolf Press, 2025) was a finalist for the Maya Angelou Book Award and was included in Time magazine’s list of “The 100 Must-Read Books of 2025.”
The recipient of a Guggenheim and Lannan Literary Fellowship, she served as a Visiting Writer at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her poetry has appeared in POETRY Magazine, Tin House, the American Poetry Review, among other journals and anthologies. Her essays have been published in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Truthout, espnW, and elsewhere. Mai Der also co-edited How Do I Begin: A Hmong American Literary Anthology with the Hmong American Writers’ Circle. She teaches in the MFA Program in Creative Writing at Fresno State and recently served as the Endowed Chair in Creative Writing at Texas State University.
*Short Bio: Mai Der Vang is the author of Primordial (Graywolf Press, 2025), Yellow Rain (Graywolf Press, 2021), and Afterland (Graywolf Press, 2017). Her honors include the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize from the Academy of American Poets, an American Book Award, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry, the First Book Award from the Academy of American Poets, among others. The recipient of a Guggenheim and Lannan Literary Fellowship, she teaches in the MFA Program in Creative Writing at Fresno State and recently served as the Endowed Chair in Creative Writing at Texas State University.