Flynn had no contact with his father throughout most of his childhood and adolescence as his parents separated when he was six months old. As a child, he was discouraged from pursuing a writing career because his father had identified himself as a writer to his mother when they first met. Flynn claims that, along with his father's alcoholism, a reason for his parents' separation was his father's "delusion of greatness" directly connected to his being an artist. Flynn first became an electrician instead of a writer after graduating high school, because of the stigma associated with the latter.
At 20, he was offered a scholarship to study English at University of Massachusetts Amherst. He studied with Fred Robinson, who was then married to Marilyn Robinson—she would sometimes teach his classes. It was at UMass that Flynn was first exposed to contemporary poetry, in a workshop taught by James Tate. In fall of 1982 Flynn's mother committed suicide. Subsequently unable to continue with his studies, Flynn dropped out of school and ended up working at the Pine Street Inn, a homeless shelter in Boston. He took classes at various colleges and universities over the next several years to finish his undergraduate degree, while living in the Fort Point Channel on a boat he and a friend had renovated.[citation needed]
From 1992 to 1999, he was a member of the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project at Columbia University, in which he served as an educator and consultant in New York public schools. He left Brooklyn in 1999 for a second fellowship at the Fine Arts Work Center, where he finished his first book of poems, Some Ether (2000), begun ten years earlier. That same year he was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, as well as an Amy Lowell Traveling Poetry Fellowship, which allowed him to live in Rome from 2001 to 2003. While in Rome he finished work on Another Bullshit Night in Suck City, as well as traveling extensively, mainly to Dublin, Paris, and Tanzania. It was in Rome where he met and became friends with Austrian filmmaker Hubert Sauper. Flynn collaborated on Sauper's Academy Awards nominated documentary Darwin's Nightmare—traveling to Tanzania for the filming and to Paris for the editing.[citation needed]
Since 2004, Flynn has been a Professor on the Creative Writing faculty at the University of Houston, where he is in residence each Spring, teaching workshops in poetry and interdisciplinary / collaborative art.[citation needed]
In 2009, he married his long-time partner, actress Lili Taylor. Flynn and Taylor live in Brooklyn with their daughter, Maeve.
This Is the Night Our House Will Catch Fire (2020) circles around the lingering effects of his mother having set their house on fire when he was six years old. It is a hybrid of several genres, including memoir, fairy tale, theater, police reports, poetry, essay, speculative fiction, and magic realism. It is the sibling to I Will Destroy You (2019), which Flynn revised by performing each poem with his band Killdeer over the five years of its writing.
The Reenactments (2013) chronicles Flynn's experience during the making of Being Flynn, a 2012 film based on his acclaimed 2004 memoir, Another Bullshit Night in Suck City. His readings on neuroscience and memory, including books by V. S. Ramachandran, David Eagleman, and Antonio Damasio, helped him to comprehend his experience of being on set for the reenactment of his mother's death by Julianne Moore. My Feelings (2015) is the sibling to The Reenactments.
In The Ticking Is the Bomb (2009), his second memoir, Flynn explored U.S. state-sanctioned torture, as well as his decision to have a child. The title was inspired by the Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hanh, who Flynn has studied with since 1990. It is the sibling to The Captain Asks for a Show of Hands (2011), which continued on similar themes.
Another Bullshit Night in Suck City (2004), a New York Times Bestseller, won the PEN/Martha Albrand Award for the Art of the Memoir, was a finalist for France's Prix Femina, and has been translated into fifteen languages. It documents Flynn's years working at The Pine Street Inn, a homeless shelter in Boston. It uses a form of lyric reportage to examine the creation of homelessness in the U.S., as well as his relationship with his father. It includes lyric fragments, short plays, lists, and documents. Another Bullshit Night in Suck City is the sibling to his first book of poetry, Some Ether (2000), which won the inaugural PEN/Joyce Osterweil Award for Poetry in 1999, and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize.
His book Low was published by in 2023.
Awards
2020 Writers' League of Texas Book Award (Finalist), I Will Destroy You
2018 Djerassi Resident Artists Program (Residency)
2018 Lannan Residency Fellowship (Residency)
2015 10 July 2015 proclaimed Nick Flynn Day by Boston Mayor Marty Walsh
2014 Erikson Institute Prize for Excellence in Mental Health Media
Render / An Apocalypse, Rebecca Gayle Howell (Cleveland State University Poetry Center, 2013) ISBN978-0986025730
The Hide-and-Seek Muse, Lisa Russ Spaar (Drunken Boat Media, 2013) ISBN978-0988241602
Ploughshares (Introduction, 2012)
Collaborations and limited editions
Cartoon Physics, Sara Press, artist. (Deeply Game Publishing, 2019)
City of Notions, Danielle Legros Georges, ed. (City of Boston, 2017 ["Marathon," "Aquarium"]
Girls in Trees, Rebecca Godfrey, ed. (Instar Lodge, 2016) ["When I Was a Girl"]
The Ezra Pound Collection,Beowulf Sheehan, photographer. (Horowitz, 2016) [portrait]
The Funk & Wag from A to Z,Mel Chin, concept artist (The Menil Collection, 2014) [editor / collaborator] ISBN978-0300204506
Lexique Nomade, (Assises du Roman, 2012) ["Mot"]
Re d acted, Daniel Heyman, artist (2011). ["7 testimonies"]
Saudade, Mischa Richter, photographer. (Land's End Press, 2010) ["saudade"] ISBN978-0982884904
River of Words: Portraits of Hudson Valley Writers, Nina Shengold, ed. / Jennifer May, photographer (Excelsior Editions, 2010) [profile / portrait] ISBN978-1438434254
Damaged Romanticism: A Mirror of Modern Emotion, Terrie Sultan, ed. (Giles, 2008) ISBN978-1904832515 ["A Crystal Formed Entirely of Holes"]
Tables of Contents Community Cookbook, Evan Hanczor, ed. (2021)
Diario de la Pandemia, Guadalupe Nettel, ed. (Revista de la Universidad de Mexico, 2020) ["Corona"]
Staying Human: New Poems for Staying Alive, Neil Astley, ed. (Bloodaxe Books, 2020) ISBN978-1780373904 ["The Day Lou Reed Died"]
More Truly and More Strange: 100 Contemporary Self-Portrait Poems, Lisa Russ Spaar, ed. (Persea Books, 2020) ISBN978-0892555062 ["self-exam (my body is a cage)"]
Brooklyn Poets Anthology, Jason Koo & Joe Pan, eds. (Brooklyn Arts Press, 2017) ISBN978-1936767526 ["false prophet", etc.]
Bullets Into Bells: Poets & Citizens Respond to Gun Violence, Brian Clements, Alexandra Teague & Dean Rader, eds. (Beacon Press, 2017) ISBN978-0807025581 ["My Mother Contemplating Her Gun"]
Inheriting the War; Poetry & Prose by Descendants of Vietnam Veterans and Refugees, Laren McClung, ed. (W.W. Norton, 2017) ISBN978-0393354287 ["The Fruit of My Deeds"]
Los Hijos de Whitman, Francisco Larios, ed. (Valparaiso, 2017) ISBN978-6078437238 ["Fisica de los Dibujos Animados, 1st parte"]
The Golden Shovel Anthology: Poems Honoring Gwendolyn Brooks, Peter Kahn, Ravi Shakar, & Patricia Smith, eds. (University of Arkansas Press, 2017) ISBN9781682260241 ["Sky Burial"]
Girls in Trees, Rebecca Godfrey, ed. (limited edition, 2016) ["When I Was a Girl"]
Awake at the Bedside: Contemplative Teachings on Pallative & End-of-Life Care, Koshin Paley Ellison & Matt Weingast, eds. (Wisdom Press, 2016) ISBN978-1614291190 ["The Washing of the Body"]
Why We Write About Ourselves, Meredith Maren, ed. (Plume, 2016) ISBN978-0142181973 [excerpts from The Reenactments / interview]
If Bees Are Few: A Hive of Bee Poems, James P. Lenfestley, ed. (University of Minnesota Press, 2016) ISBN978-0816698066 ["Hive", etc.]
Monticello in Mind: Fifty Contemporary Poems on Jefferson, Lisa Russ Spaar, ed. (University of Virginia Press, 2016) ISBN978-0813938509 ["When I Was a Girl"]
A Manner of Being: Writers on their Mentors, Annie Liontas & Jeff Parker, eds. (University of Massachusetts Press, 2016) ISBN978-1625341815 ["On Phil Levine"]
Family Resemblances: An Anthology & Exploration of 8 Hybrid Literary Genres, Marcela Sulak & Jacqueline Kolosov, eds. (Rose Metal Press, 2015) ISBN978-1941628027 ["On "Santa Lear""]
Because You Asked: A Book of Answers on the Art & Craft of the Writing Life, Katrina Roberts, ed. (Lost Horse Press, 2015) ISBN978-0990819356 ["Aftermath"]
365 Poems for Every Occasion, Academy of American Poets / Poem-A-Day, eds. (Abrams Image, 2015) ISBN978-1419717994 ["forgetting something", etc.]
Words Without Walls: Writers on Addiction, Violence, & Incarceration, Sheryl St. Germain & Sarah Shotland, eds. (Trinity University Press, 2015) ISBN978-1595342553 ["same again"]
The Penguin Anthology of Twentieth Century American Poetry, Rita Dove, ed. (Penguin Books, 2013) ISBN978-0143121480 ["Bag of Mice", etc.]
The Strangest of Theaters: Poets Writing Across Borders, Jared Hawkley, Susan Rich & Brian Turner, eds. (McSweeneys, 2013) ISBN978-1938073274 ["Field Poet"]
Death Poems, Russ Kick, ed. (Disinformation Books, 2013) ISBN978-1938875045 ["My Mother Contemplating Her Gun"]
Braving the Fire: A Guide to Writing About Grief & Loss, Jessica Handler (ed.) (Griffin, 2013) ISBN978-1250014634 [excerpts / interviews]
Coming Close: Forty Essays on Philip Levine, Mari L'Esperance & Tomas Q. Morin, eds. (Prairie Lights Books, 2013) ISBN978-0985932527 ["A Light Inside']
American Tensions: Literature of Identity & the Search for Social Justice, William Reichard, ed. (New Village Press, 2011) ISBN978-0981559384 ["Other Meaning"]
The Autobiographer's Handbook, Jennifer Trang, ed. (Holt Paperback, 2008) ISBN978-0805087130 [interview]
Sex for America: Politically Inspired Erotica, Stephen Elliott, ed. (Harper Perennial, 2008) ISBN978-0061351211 ["A Crystal Formed Entirely of Holes"]
Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six-Word Memoirs by Writers Famous & Obscure, Rachel Fershleiser & Larry Smith, eds. (Harper Perennial, 2008) ISBN978-0061374050
State of the Union: 50 Political Poems, Joshua Beckman & Matthew Zapruder, eds. (Wave Books, 2008) ISBN978-1933517339 ["imagination"]
The Book of Irish American Poetry: From the 18th Century to the Present, Daniel Tobin, ed. (University of Notre Dame Press, 2007) ISBN978-0268042301
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