Brockport author nominated for National Book Award

The National Book Foundation named William Heyen, SUNY Brockport professor of English and poet emeritus, a finalist for a 2004 National Book Award for his book of poetry, Shoah Train (Etruscan Press). The book is a collection of more than 70 poems Heyen has written on the topic of the Holocaust over the last dozen years. Shoah is the Hebrew word for annihilation.

National Book Award winners receive $10,000 each and a bronze statue; each finalist receives a bronze medal and a $1,000 cash award.

Heyen, of Brockport, a 1961 graduate of SUNY Brockport and professor of English from 1967 until his retirement in 2000, is a past recipient of Fulbright, NEA, American Academy of Arts & Letters, Guggenheim, and other fellowships and prizes.