biography
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elisavietta ritchie
Contact: elisavietta@chesapeake.net
PO Box 298, Broomes Island, MD 20615
3207 Macomb St. NW Washington, DC 20008-3327
Elisavietta Ritchie has been described as "an elegant woman for whom age is irrelevant," one who is "attractive, vigorous and expressive. Very expressive." Her various life experiences have all inspired her to write.
CONSTANT MOTION
Ritchie's earlier years involved her family's yearly moves. Independently, she continued traveling. She has studied in Paris, Ithaca, New York, and California and has lived with her first husband and her children in Malaysia, Cyprus, Lebanon, France, Canada, Australia, and Washington, DC.
EDUCATION
Education includes: The Sorbonne, University of Paris, (diploma “Mention Tres Bien,” equivalent to magna cum laude); Cornell University; University of California at Berkeley (combined BA in French, Russian and English); Georgetown University (post-graduate Russian courses); American University where she worked and studied for several years (MA in French literature, minor in Russian studies)
1968-74: During this time she worked as a part-time lecturer in French, then a graduate teaching fellow, while pursuing studies in 19th-20th century French literature and 20th century Russian culture. Ritchie also attended seminars in teaching languages.
Further studies include The Writer’s Center (master workshops in poetry, fiction, play-writing); Toronto Martial Arts Commission, and several intensive training workshops sponsored by The National Association for Poetry Therapy.
RECOGNITION
In Haste I Write You This Note: Stories & Half-Stories - winner of the Washington Writer's Publishing House premiere fiction prize (2000)
Awaiting Permission to Land - winner of the Anamnesis Poetry Manuscript Award
Tightening the Circle Over Eel County - winner of the Great Lakes Colleges Association's "New Writer's Prize for Best First Book of Poetry 1975-6"
Raking the Snow - winner of the Washington Writer's Publishing House 1981-2 competition
Individual poems, stories, and collections were winners or finalists in many competitions and nominated for several Pushcart Prizes
Ritchie was awarded a graduate teaching fellowship at American University, two annual Poetry Society of America awards, four grants from the DC Commision for the Arts, and several fellowships at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts.
RITCHIE'S POETRY BOOKS/ANTHOLOGIES OR TEXTBOOKS INCLUDING RITCHIE'S WORK
Awaiting Permission to Land (2006)
The Spirit of the Walrus (2005)
Only the Sea Keeps: poems for the tsunami victims
Still Going Strong (an anthology on women improving with age)
Bombshells: War Stories and Poems by Women on the Homefront
The Arc of the Storm (1998)
Elegy for the Other Woman (1996)
A Wound-Up Cat and Other Bedtime Stories
A Sheaf of Dreams and Other Games
Moving to Larger Quarters
The Problem with Eden
Timbot (a novella in verse)
Wild Garlic: The Journal of Maria X (a novella in verse)
Sound and Sense
The 90th Aniversary Poetry Anthology
When I'm an Old Woman I Shall Wear Purple
If I Had My Life to Live Over I Would Pick More Daisies
The Tie That Binds
If I Had a Hammer, Grow Old Along with Me/the Best Is Yet to Be
Generation to Generation
Beyond Lament
Life on the Line
Selections on Words and Healing
The Use of Narratives in the Helping Professions
A Teacher's Casebook
Diamond's Are a Girl's Best Friend
among others
OTHER ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Ritchie has translated or co-translated work by Russian, French, African, Indonesian, Malaysian, Macedonian, Slovenian, Bulgarian, and Brazilian writers, as well as Ukrainian Lyubov Sirota's Chernobyl poems. Her own work has been translated into a dozen languages, including Japanese, Romanian, and Cebu.
Ritchie has read at the Library of Congress, Harbourfront, Folger Library, Pittsburgh International Forum, Harvard, Colby, Maryland, University of Southern California, York and Brock universities, and many other libraries and universities. colleges, schools, poetry societies, bookstores and other cultural centers in the United States, Canada, Australia, Russia, and under the auspices of the United States Information Agency, in Brazil, around the Far East (Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Hong Kong, South Korea, Japan), and the Balkans.
She created and edited the anthologies The Dolphin's Arc: Poems on Endangered Creatures of the Sea and Finding The Name. Ritchie has also line-edited various works of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry for other writers, particularly in Washington Writers’ Publishing House, where she is president for fiction, formerly for poetry.
Other professional work over the years includes editing, translating, writing and public relations for government and private clients, revising The American Express Guide to Washington DC,setting up cultural programs at nursing homes, and practicing photography in Canada and Australia for The New York Times, Christian Science Monitor, Ageing International, etc.
Among her pro bono activities: For three years Ritchie served as president of Washington Writer's Publishing House, helping other poets to publish and publicize their work. She founded The Wineberry Press. She hosted a program for WAMU-FM interviewing poets and writers, and for several years served on the Poetry Committee of the Greater Washington Area at the Folger Shakespeare Library. She mentors high school students of poetry and also helps adults edit their manuscripts.
AT PRESENT
Southern Maryland and Washington DC have constituted "home" for Ritchie since 1959, but she still travels extensively. Other interests include tennis, ocean and wildlife conservation, marine biology, and sailing. She is married to Clyde Farnsworth, novelist and former New York Times correspondent, and has one daughter, two sons, and two stepsons.
Ritchie often teaches creative writing workshops for both adults an children. She also leads workshops for teachers about the poetry-in-the-schools programs as part of her pursuit to ensure incorporation of the arts as a regular part of school cirriculum.
On her own, Ritchie continues her studies in various fields ranging from Buddhism to biology.