Ilya Kaminsky


Ilya Kaminsky is a hard-of-hearing, USSR-born, Ukrainian-Russian-Jewish-American poet, critic, translator and professor. He is best-known for his poetry collections Dancing in Odessa and Deaf Republic, which have earned him several awards.

Life

Kaminsky was born in Odessa, former Soviet Union, on April 18, 1977 to a Jewish family. He became hard of hearing at the age of four due to mumps. He began to write poetry as a teenager in Odessa, publishing a chapbook in Russian entitled The Blessed City. His family was granted political asylum to live in the United States in 1993 due to anti-semitism in Ukraine. He started to write poems in English in 1994.
His first book in English, Dancing in Odessa, received several literary awards.
Kaminsky has a Bachelor of Arts in political science from Georgetown University and a J.D. from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. He has worked as a professor at the Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts since 2018.

Honors and awards

Poetry Collections

Chapbooks
Editor