University Times

Judith Vollmer, director of the creative writing program at Pitt's Greensburg campus (UPG), has won two national poetry prizes.

Vollmer's limited edition collection, "Black Butterfly," was named the 1997 winner of The Center for the Book Arts Prize. It was chosen over about 1,000 other submissions in the national contest by final judge Mark Doty, a winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award.

The Center for the Book, a non-profit group dedicated to promoting book publishing, will publish "Black Butterfly" as a letterpress book in an edition of 100 signed copies on Oct. 24. Vollmer's other prize winning book was "The Door Open to the Fire." It was chosen over 900 submissions for the Cleveland State University Poetry Center Prize by poet and critic Liz Rosenberg.

"The Door Open to the Fire" is Vollmer's second full-length book of poetry. Her first, "Level Green," was published in 1990 by the University of Wisconsin Press and won the Brittingham Prize in Poetry.

The Center for the Book Arts Prize and the Cleveland State University Poetry Center Prize each include a $1,000 honorarium.