Biography & Works
SUZANNE WADLEY JAWORSKI RHODENBAUGH is a poet, essayist & critic born in Tampa, 1944, to Georgia natives Marguerite Douglas Wadley & William Morrill Wadley, III. She lives in St. Louis and is the author of
The Girl Who Quit at Leviticus (Homestead Lighthouse Press, 2022)
"The poems offer a rich and varied world...The music, the wry humor, & the precise
imagery combine to create the voice of a woman who has lived deeply..."
-- Marjorie Stelmach
The Whole Shebang (WordTech, 2010)
Narrative & lyric poems.
"...granite clarity, easy-rolling wit & a searing honesty..." -- Pattiann Rogers
Lick of Sense (Helicon Nine Editions, 2001)
Winner of the Marianne Moore Poetry Prize.
"...as if Elizabeth Bishop suddenly turned up in a Southern gothic..." -- Molly Peacock
The Deepest South I've Gotten and Other Essays (Hell Yes Press, 2017)
23 short essays first written or published 1971-2017, on people, places, politics & poetry.
Four poetry chapbooks: A Gold Rain at Lonelyfarm (Heatherstone Press, 1990);
Gardening Where the Land Remembers War (Two Herons Press, 1992);
The Shine on Loss (Winner of the Painted Bride Quarterly Chapbook Series, 1998);
Greatest Hits, 1970-2000 (Pudding House Publications, 2001).
Poems, essays, articles & reviews widely published in periodicals & anthologies, including:
The American Scholar, The Hudson Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, New England
Review, Poetry East, Salmagundi, Southern Poetry Review, The Washington Post;
& anthologies by Columbia University Press, Black Sparrow Press, Texas Review Press,
The Spirit That Moves Us Press & others.
BA, English, University of South Florida, 1966; MPH, Medical Care Administration,
University of Michigan, 1974; MFA, Creative Writing - Poetry, Vermont College, 1987;
Hebrew Ulpan, Kibbutz Ginegar, Israel, 1969; Farrar Scholar in Poetry, Bread Loaf
Writers Conference, 1988; Poetry Fellow, Vermont Studio Center, 1993.
Since 1976 married to Tom Rhodenbaugh, an administrator of poverty, labor and human rights
programs. Stepmother of a daughter and son, birthmother of a daughter.
Literary papers in the Suzanne Wadley Jaworski Rhodenbaugh Papers, Special Collections, University of South Florida Library, Tampa.
BOOKS AVAILABLE FROM Barnes & Noble, Homestead Lighthouse Press and
other online sources, and from DUNAWAY BOOKS, ST. LOUIS: booksdunaway@gmail.com.