Pulitzer Prize Winner Teaching At U Of A

The winner of the Pulitzer Prize for poetry is Franz Wright, who is spending the current semester teaching at University of Arkansas at Fayetteville. Wright won the high honor yesterday for his book, "Walking to Martha`s Vineyard." His father was James Wright, who won a Pulitzer in 1972 for "Collected Poems" and died in 1980. Franz Wright said yesterday he wished his father could share the moment. Franz Wright was born in Vienna, Austria, in 1953, while his father was a Fulbright scholar. He later lived in Seattle, Minneapolis and San Francisco with his mother after his parents divorced. He graduated from Oberlin College. He makes his permanent home in Massachusetts. Wright calls "Walking to Martha`s Vineyard" the "most overtly religious book" he`s ever written. His previous work, "Beforelife," was written while he was recovering from drug addiction. Around the same time, he was baptized into the Catholic Church. His latest work reflects that part of his life.