Irene McKinney

Irene McKinney (April 20, 1939 – February 4, 2012) was an American poet and editor, who served as the Poet Laureate of the state of West Virginia.

Life
McKinney was born in Belington, West Virgina. She earned a B.A. in English Literature at West Virginia Wesleyan College,  an M.A. at West Virginia University and a Ph.D. in English literature from the University of Utah.

She was a protégé of and editor for Louise McNeill; a relationship which helped form her commitment to regionalism in writing. She died of cancer at the family home in Barbour County at the age of 72.

Recognition
She received fellowships, grants, and residencies from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, the MacDowell Colony, the West Virginia Commission on the Arts, the Utah Arts Council, and the Kentucky Foundation for Women. She won the Cincinnati Review Annual Poetry Prize.

In 1994 she was appointed poet laureate of West Virginia, a position she held until her death.

Poetry

 * Unthinkable: Collected Poems 1976-2004 (Red Hen Press, 2009)
 * Vivid Companion (Vandalia Press, 2004)
 * Six O'Clock Mine Report (U of Pittsburgh Press, 1989)
 * Quick Fire and Slow Fire (North Atlantic Books, 1988)
 * The Wasps at the Blue Hexagons (Small Plot Press, 1984)
 * The Girl With the Stone in Her Lap (North Atlantic Books, 1976)

Edited
Backcountry: Contemporary Writing in West Virginia (Editor, Vandalia Press, 2002)