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Phyllis Nelson Barber (1943- )
Nevada Writers Hall of Fame 2005
Phyllis N. Barber was born in Nevada and grew up in Boulder City and Las Vegas. She can trace her family's Nevada roots to the 1860s. Trained as a classical pianist, she has served on the Board of Directors for the Utah Symphony. She later worked as a feature writer for the Utah Holiday magazine. She received a Master of Fine Arts degree in creative writing from Vermont College and has taught in its Writing Program. Her autobiography, How I Got Cultured, won the 1991 Association of Writers & Writing Programs Prize for Creative Nonfiction and the 1993 Award for Best Autobiography from the Association of Mormon Letters. In 1984, she co-founded the Writers at Work non-profit literary organization in Park City, Utah.
Her short story, "Wild Sage," received Special Mention in Pushcart Prize XIII (1988-89). Two of her short
stories won third prize in the Dialogue Writing Awards - Fiction: "The Whip: A Mormon Folktale" in 1986 and
"Bird of Paradise" in 1991. Another short story, "Mormon Levis," won first prize in the 1996 Brookie and D. K. Brown
Memorial Fiction Contest. She currently lives in Utah.
Bibliography for Phyllis Barber
Novels and Children's Books:
And The Desert Shall Blossom. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1991. [Available: Getchell Library, Special Collections: PS 3552 .A59197 A83 1991; and Great Basin College, Elko, NV]
Legs: The Story of a Giraffe. New York: McElderry Books, 1991. [Available: Getchell Library: PS 3552 .A59197 L44 1991 and: Washoe Co. Library, Sierra View Branch: CHILDREN'S FICTION Ba 1991]
Smiley Snake's Adventure. Provo, UT: Aro, 1980. [Available: Getchell Library: PS 3552 .A59197 S555 1980]
Short Stories:
"At the Talent Show"
"Bird of Paradise." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Fall, 1991) Vol. 24, no. 3.
"The Boy and the Hand"
"Bread for Gunnar." Weber Studies (Fall 1993) Vol. 10, no. 3.
"A Brief History of Seagulls: A Trilogy with Notes"
"Devil Horse." New Hampshire College Journal (Spring 1995) no. 12.
"Dust to Dust: A Mormon Folktale." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought (Winter 1994) Vol. 27, no. 4.
"The Fiddler and the Wolf." Sunstone (April 1995) no. 18.
"Ida's Sabbath." Sunstone (May-June 1983) no. 8, p. 39.
"Mormon Levis." in:
- Parting the Veil: Stories from a Mormon Imagination, pp. 113-124.
- Quarterly West (Autumn/Winter 1996-97), pp. 178-186.
- The River Underground: An Anthology of Nevada Fiction. Reno: University of Nevada Press, 2001. [Available: Getchell Library: PS 571 .N3 R58 2001; Great Basin College, Elko, NV; and WNC-Carson City]
- Sunstone (Dec. 1998) no. 112, p. 42.
Parting the Veil: Stories from a Mormon Imagination. Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1999. [Available: Getchell Library: PS 3552 .A59197 P37 1999]
"Prophet by the Sea." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought (Fall 1994) Vol. 27, no. 3.
The School of Love: Short Stories. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1990. [Available: Getchell Library: PS 3552 .A59197 S346 1990]
"Spirit Babies." in:
- Quarterly West (Summer/Fall 1994)
- In Our Lovely Deseret: Mormon Fictions. Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1998; pp. 189-198, 287. [Available: Getchell Library: PS 647 .M67 I53 1998]
- Walking the Twilight II: Women Writers of the Southwest. Flagstaff, AZ: Northland, 1996. [Available: Getchell Library: PS 566 W35 1996; and Great Basin College, Elko, NV]
"The Whip: A Mormon Folktale." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Winter 1987) Vol. 20, no. 4.
"Wild Sage." in:
- Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought (Summer 1987) Vol. 20, no. 2.
- Beloit Fiction Journal (1994) no. 9. Index to its Fiction
"Windows." Sunstone (August 1986) no. 55.
Nonfiction:
"Body Blue: Excerpts from a Novoir." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Summer, 2003), Vol. 36, no. 2.
"CAUTION: Men in Trees (review)." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Winter, 1999), Vol. 32, no. 4.
"Culture Shock" in A World We Thought We Knew: Readings in Utah History. Salt Lake City, UT: University of Utah Press, 1995. [Available: Getchell Library: F 826.5 .W67 1995; also online via netLibrary for UNR-affiliated users, only)
"From How I Got Cultured: A Nevada Memoir (excerpt)" in Literary Las Vegas: The Best Writing about America's Most Fabulous City. New York: Holt, 1995. [Available: Getchell Library, Special Collections: PS 574 .L37 L58 1995; and Great Basin College, Elko, NV]
How I Got Cultured: A Nevada Memoir. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1992. [Available: Getchell Library: CT 275 .B3675 A3 1992; Great Basin College, Elko, NV; , TMCC, WNC-Carson City, and WNC-Fallon campuses]
How I Got Cultured: A Nevada Memoir. [Cassette ed.] Washington, D.C.: National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, 1994.
"Intimacy in a Three-Piece Suit (review)." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Spring, 1984). Vol. 17, no. 1.
"The Mormon Woman as Writer." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Fall, 1990), Vol. 23, no. 3.
"Oh Say What is Truth?"
"On Rewriting and Practicing the Piano." Weber Studies (Spring, 1989), Vol. 6, no. 1.
"The Precarious Walk Away from Mormonism, All the Time with a Stitch in My Side." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Fall, 1996), Vol. 29, no. 2.
"To Be or Not to Be a Regional Artist: Is That a Question?"
"Where the Walls of the World Wear Thin (review of Red Water by Judith Freeman." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Winter, 2002), Vol. 35, no. 4.
Biographical Sources & Critical Response:
And the Desert Shall Blossom: A Novel - reviews
- Bennion, John. "And the Desert Shall Blossom." Weber Studies (Spring/Summer, 1992), Vol. 9, no. 2.
- Dawid, Annie. "And the Desert Shall Bloom." Western American Literature (Fall, 1992), Vol. 27, no. 3. [Available: Getchell Library: PS 271 W46 1992]
"Announcements." Newsletter (MFA In Writing-Vermont College/Union Institute & University). February, 2005.
"Barber, Phyllis. How I Got Cultured: A Nevada Memoir." in Women in Nevada History: An Annotated Bibliography of Published Sources. Reno, NV: Nevada Women's History Project, 2000. [Available: Getchell Library: HQ 1438 .N3 W66 2000; and at WNC's Carson City, Douglas, and Fallon campuses]
Bush, Laura L. "Training to Be a Good Mormon Girl While Longing for Fame -- How I Got Cultured: A Nevada Memoir" in Faithful Transgressions in the American West: Six Twentieth-Century Mormon Women's Autobiographical Acts. Logan: Utah State University Press, 2004. [Available: Getchell Library: PS 153 .M66 B87 2004]
"Expressions: A Literary Festival." English/Creative Writing Dept., Stephens College (Columbia, MO; Oct. 14-18, 2004).
Ford, Jean; Glass, Betty J.; and Gould, Martha B., eds. Women in Nevada History: An Annotated Bibliography of Published Sources. Reno, NV: Nevada Women's History Project, 2000. [Available: Getchell Library: HQ 1438 .N3 W66 2000; Truckee Meadows Community College; Western Nevada Community College, Carson City & Fallon campuses]
"Girls State Last Session Is Held Here." Reno Evening Gazette (June 25, 1960), p. 9.
How I Got Cultured - reviews
- Dawid, Annie. "How I Got Cultured." The Sunday Oregonian (Portland, Oregon). (Jan. 22, 1995). [Available via LexisNexis Academic Universe for UNR users, only]
- McDermott, Don J. "A Memorable Tribute." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Fall, 1993). Vol. 26, no. 3.
"A 'Marriage Group' of Contemporary Mormon Short Stories: A Selected Reading List." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Winter, 2004) Vol. 37, no. 4.
"MFA In Writing Faculty News." Newsletter (Vermont College/Union Institute & University; Feb. 2004), p. 8.
Parting the Veil: Stories from a Mormon Imagination -
- Robertson, Mary Ellen. "Making Miracles." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Fall, 2000), Vol. 33, no. 3.
"Phyllis Barber." Mormon Literature Database. Provo, Utah: Mormon Literature Database Committee at the Harold B. Lee Library of Brigham Young University.
The School of Love - reviews
- Cannon, Helen B. "Strange Love. The School of Love." Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. (Winter, 1990). Vol. 23, no. 4.
- Swenson, Paul. "The School of Love." Weber Studies (Fall, 1990). Vol. 7, no. 2.
"Special Mention ("Wild Sage"). The Pushcart Prize, XIII: Best of the Small Presses. Wainscott, NY: Pushcart, 1988; p. 428. [Available: Getchell Library: PS 501 .P87 v. 13 1988/89]
"2 authors inducted in Hall of Fame." Reno Gazette-Journal (Oct. 1, 2005), p. E1. [Available: Getchell Library, Main Reference Microfilm: N9j 2005]
"2005 Nevada Hall of Fame honors Wiley and Barber." University of Nevada, Reno Friends of the Library Newsletter. (Fall 2005), p. 1.
Walker, Pamela. "How I Got Cultured (review)." Western American Literature (Summer, 1993), Vol. 28, no. 2. [Available: Getchell Library: PS 271 W46 1993]
Please direct questions about this bibliography to Betty Glass.
Please direct questions to Millie Mitchell
Director of Development, University Libraries
University of Nevada, RenoUpdated 29 March 2008