R. T. Smith serves as Writer-in-Residence at Washington and Lee University, where he has edited Shenandoah since 1995. His dozen books of poetry include Messenger (LSU) and Outlaw Style (Arkansas), both of which received the annual Library of Virginia Book Award. His fourth collection of stories, Sherburne, appeared from Stephen F. Austin University Press in 2012. Smith's work has appeared in "Best American" anthologies of poetry, fiction and mysteries, and he has received three Pushcart Prizes. He has lived in Georgia, Alabama and North Carolina and currently resides in Rockbridge County, Virginia with his wife, the writer Sarah Kennedy.
"In The Red Wolf: A Dream of Flannery O'Connor, R. T. Smith fuses the facts of Flannery O'Connor's biography with a richly imagined dreamscape, taking us from Yaddo to Iowa to Milledgeville, Georgia ... With the intricate artistry for which he is deservedly known, Smith creates and sustains a voice surprising as it is believable ... The Red Wolf will delight O'Connor fans and seduce anyone not already smitten."
—Claudia Emerson
"Raise the curtain. Here she is: R. T. Smith's Miss Flannery herself, stumping her crutches onto the stage to wrestle 'the prophets and blessed dimwits' down to the mat and onto the page.... Smith has given us a book that's an act of love if ever there was one.
—Alice Friman
"R. T. Smith is one of the most vital voices in contemporary American poetry."
—The Georgia Review
Louisiana Literature Press
