Poet and teacher Gail Thomas has published four books: Odd Mercy (2016), Waving Back (2015), No Simple Wilderness: An Elegy for Swift River Valley (2001) and Finding the Bear (1997). Odd Mercy was chosen by Ellen Bass for the Charlotte Mew Prize of Headmistress Press, and its “Little Mommy Sonnets” won Honorable Mention for the Tom Howard/ Margaret Prize for Traditional Verse. Also, Waving Back was named a Must Read for 2016 by the Massachusetts Center for the Book and Honorable Mention in the New England Book Festival. Thomas’s work has appeared in many journals and anthologies including the Beloit Poetry Journal, Calyx, and North American Review. Individual poems have won the Naugatuck Review’s Narrative Poetry Prize and the Pat Schneider Prize. She was awarded residencies at MacDowell and Ucross. Her book, No Simple Wilderness, about the creation of the Quabbin Reservoir in the 1930’s has been taught in college courses. As one of the original teaching artists for the Massachusetts Cultural Council’s Elder Arts Initiative, Thomas led workshops and collaborated with dancers, musicians and storytellers in schools, nursing homes, hospitals and libraries across the state. Thomas teaches, speaks at conferences and poetry festivals, and reads her work widely in community and academic settings.
Gail Thomas
Studios
Sorosis
Gail Thomas worked in the Sorosis studio.
Sorosis Studio was funded by the New York Carol Club of Sorosis. The small, masonry studio was designed by F. Winsor, Jr., the architect who also designed Savidge Library (1926) and Mixter Studio (1927). At the time of construction, the large porch on the southeast façade offered a spectacular mountain view that has since been obscured…