Dream Drawings: Configurations of a Timeless Kind - Enchanting Prose Poetry Celebrating Language, Heritage, and the Human Spirit

“[Momaday] must be ranked among the greatest of our contemporary writers.”—American Scholar

"Momaday’s poems are rich with description, lush with dreaming, and filled with magic." — Library Journal (starred review)

From Pulitzer Prize winner and revered literary master N. Scott Momaday, a beautiful and enchanting new poetry collection, at once a celebration of language, imagination, and the human spirit.

“Language and the imagination work hand in hand, and together they enable us to reveal us to ourselves in story. That is indeed a magical process. . . . We imagine and we dream, and we translate our dreams into language.” —from the Preface

A singular voice in American letters, Momaday’s love of language and storytelling are on full display in this brilliant new collection comprising one hundred sketches or “dream drawings”—furnishings of the mind—as he calls them. Influenced by his Native American heritage and its oral storytelling traditions, here are prose poems about nature, animals, warriors, and hunters, as well as meditations that explore themes of love, loss, time, and memory. Each piece, full of wisdom and wonder, showcases Momaday’s extraordinary lyrical talent, the breadth of his imagination, and the transformative power of his writing. Dream Drawings is also illustrated with a selection of black-and-white paintings by Momaday that capture the spirit of his prose.

Poignant, inspired, and timeless, this is a collection that will nourish the soul.

N. Scott Momaday (1934-2024) is an internationally renowned poet, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, artist, teacher, and storyteller. He authored numerous works that include poetry, novels, essays, plays, and children’s stories. He won the Pulitzer Prize for his debut novel House Made of Dawn and was the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including the Academy of American Poets Prize, the National Medal of Arts, the Ken Burns American Heritage Prize, the Dayton Literary Peace Prize Foundation's Richard C. Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award, and the Frost Medal for distinguished lifetime achievement in poetry. A longtime professor of English and American literature, Momaday earned his PhD from Stanford University and retired as Regents Professor at the University of Arizona. In 2022, he was inducted into the inducted into the Academy of American Arts and Letters.