Eileen Myles was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. After finishing school in Boston, they moved to New York, where they soon became part of the art scene in the East Village, which was shaped by personalities such as Andy Warhol and in the literary sense by the New York School. With their idiomatic and euphoric style, Myles is \u00abone of the essential voices in American poetry\u00bb (\u00abNew York Times\u00bb). From 1977 to 1979, they edited the poetry magazine \u00abdodgems\u00bb. They gave their first poetry readings at the well-known punk club CBGB and at the cultural center of St. Mark’s Church, where Myles was the artistic director of the writing workshop in the eighties. As the first poem \u00abThe Troubador\u00bb from Myles’ fifth poetry collection, \u00abSchool of Fish\u00bb (1997) suggests, Myles sees themselves as a postmodern traveling singer. In this way, they presented their poetry and fiction, such as their first collection of stories, \u00abChelsea Girls\u00bb (1994), at performances in North America, Europe, and Russia. In 1992, they led an artistic-political feminist presidential campaign, which had already been prophesied in their poem \u00abAn American Poem\u00bb from \u00abNot Me\u00bb (1990). In the poem, Myles ironically proclaims \u00abI am a Kennedy\u00bb as they offer an unusual critique of American culture. As a member of the group Artists for Hillary, in 2016 they supported the Democratic Party candidate’s election campaign.<\/p>\n
At the center of their poems and stories is the fictional character of Eileen Myles, who expresses their lesbian identity in an artistic and self-confident way. In their first novel \u00abCool for You\u00bb (2000), the paternalism and oppression of women by institutions is addressed via the case of the Irish grandmother who emigrated to Massachusetts and is admitted to a psychiatric ward. Their art novel \u00abInferno\u00bb (2010), which combines elements of fiction, memoir, literary theory, contemporary history, and satire, celebrates important figures from the New York literary scene. In their recently published poetry collection \u00abEvolution\u00bb (2018), Myles reflects, in concise lines, on central themes of her poetic work: love, loneliness, gender, America and its politics, as well as the loss of their mother. Written in 1978 and published in 2026, \u00abBird Watching\u00bb follows a twenty-something protagonist rich in memories through New York’s art world, caught between new beginnings, happiness, and uncertainty.<\/p>\n
Myles regularly writes for publications such as \u00abThe Nation\u00bb and \u00abBook Forum\u00bb and publishes their work in the magazines \u00abIndex\u00bb and \u00abShiny\u00bb. From 2002 to 2007, Myles was Professor of Creative Writing at the University of California in San Diego. They have received a Guggenheim fellowship as well as the Lambda Book Award and the Clark Prize, among other awards. Myles lives in New York City and Marfa.<\/p>\n
Last update: 2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15360,"template":"","jct-role":[1080],"jct-origin":[657,657],"jct-ilb-years":[599,613,1025],"class_list":["post-39520","authors","type-authors","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","jct-role-author","jct-origin-usa-en","jct-ilb-years-2005-en","jct-ilb-years-2019-en","jct-ilb-years-2026-en"],"yoast_head":"\n