Wheaton English professor wins prestigious literary prize

Jane Ruby Professor of English Sue Standing's short story, ''Fast Sunday,'' won a Pushcart Prize for 2004 and appears in the 2005 Pushcart Prize Anthology. The story was originally published in Ploughshares magazine.

Standing teaches poetry and African literature at Wheaton and directs the college's creative writing program. She is the recipient of grants from the NEA and the Bunting Institute, and has published more than 150 of her poems in such periodicals as The Atlantic Monthly, The American Scholar, Agni, The Nation, Southwest Review and others. Standing is the author of five collections of poems: False Horizon (2003), Cape Split Cycle (with artist Katherine Kadish, 1998), Gravida (1995), Deception Pass (1894) and Amphibious Weather (1981).

The Pushcart Prize/Best of the Small Presses series, published every year since 1976, is among the most honored literary projects in America. Each year hundreds of small presses nominate short stories, poetry and essays, and approximately 50 works are chosen for inclusion in the Pushcart anthology.

The award is Standing's first Pushcart Prize, for which she has been nominated several times for her poems.

''I was especially surprised and delighted to receive a Pushcart Prize for 'Fast Sunday,' since it was my first published short story,'' Standing said.

''Fast Sunday'' is a coming-of-age story about a young girl, Sarah, who is disturbed by something that happens at a church testimony meeting. Throughout the story, set in Bountiful, Utah, near Salt Lake City, Standing's intention was to be faithful to Sarah's perceptions while conveying the complexity of the child's religious milieu and her relationships with family members.

Standing is currently working on more short fiction, as well as poems for her next collection, tentatively titled Trace. Her story ''Fast Sunday'' can be read online on the Ploughshares website:

http://www.pshares.org/issues/article.cfm?prmArticleID=7736