Caylin Capra-Thomas

Caylin Capra-Thomas
PhD Candidate, Graduate Instructor
04 Tate Hall
Education

BA English, University of Vermont, 2009

MFA Creative Writing, University of Montana, 2015

Research and Teaching

Areas of Study:

  • Creative Writing
  • Nonfiction
  • Poetry
  • Ecocriticism 
Bio

Pronouns: she/her

Caylin Capra-Thomas is a creative writing PhD student studying nonfiction, poetry, place, and ecocriticism. She is the author of the poetry collection Iguana Iguana (Deep Vellum 2022), which was named by the New York Public Library as a Best New Poetry Book of 2022. She is also the author of two poetry chapbooks, Inside My Electric City (YesYes Books 2017) and The Marilyn Letters (dancing girl press 2013). Her poems and essays have appeared or will soon in journals including Georgia Review, New England Review, Pleiades, Colorado Review, 32 Poems, Mississippi Review, Copper Nickel, Washington Square Review, and elsewhere. Her scholarship has appeared recently in The T. S. Eliot Studies Annual. She has been awarded fellowships and residencies from the Vermont Studio Center, the Sewanee Writer's Conference, and the Studios of Key West, and she was the 2018-2020 poet-in-residence at Idyllwild Arts Academy.

Awards and Honors

William Peden Award for Outstanding Teaching of Creative Writing, University of Missouri, 2023

Frances Kerr Award for Poetry, University of Missouri, 2023

Best Graduate Paper, University of Missouri English Department, 2022

Hien and Emily Nguyen Award, University of Missouri English Department, 2022

First Place Creative Writing Department Award in Nonfiction, University of Missouri, 2021

2019 Milton Kessler Memorial Prize in Poetry for “Search History Sad”

2019 Laux/Millar Poetry Prize for “Iguana Iguana”

Fairy Tale Review 2018 Poetry Prize for “At Publix, the Florida Skunk Ape Hunts Dangerous Game”

Fellowship Recipient for four-week residency at the Vermont Studio Center, 2018

Artist-in-Residence at the Studios of Key West, 2018

Baltimore Review’s 2017 Summer Contest Winner for “Bigfoot to Her Daughter”

2016 Louisville Literary Arts Writer’s Block Prize in Poetry for “I Don’t Know What People Should Do” 

2016 Prize in Nonfiction from Yemassee for “Three Things I Remember About Lady Chatterley’s Lover”

Selected Publications

Iguana Iguana, poetry collection, Deep Vellum Press, forthcoming 2022

Inside My Electric City, poetry chapbook, YesYes Books, 2017

The Marilyn Letters, poetry chapbook, dancing girl press, 2013