LISA OLSTEIN

Lisa Olstein is the author of six poetry collections published by Copper Canyon Press: Radio Crackling, Radio Gone (2006), Lost Alphabet (2009), Little Stranger (2013), Late Empire (2017), Dream Apartment (2023), and Distinguished Office of Echoes (fall 2025). Her nonfiction includes Pain Studies (Bellevue Literary Press, 2020), a book-length lyric essay on the intersection of pain, perception, and language; and Climate (Essay Press, 2022), an exchange of epistolary essays co-written with Julie Carr. She is the lyricist for the rock band Cold Satellite, fronted by Jeffrey Foucault, and in 2025 Lost Alphabet for voice, five musicians, and electronics, an adaptation of her poems by composer Januibe Tejera, premiered with Ensemble Phace. 

Olstein’s honors include a John S. Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, Pushcart Prize, Lannan Writing Residency, Hayden Carruth Award, Writers League of Texas Discovery Book Award, and Sustainable Arts Foundation award. She is the Ellen Clayton Garwood Centennial Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Texas at Austin, where she teaches in the New Writers Project and Michener Center for Writers MFA programs.

lisaolstein [at] gmail [dot] com