Dan O’Brien’s play The Body of an American won the 2014 Horton Foote Prize for Outstanding New American Play, the 2014 PEN Center USA Award for Drama, the 2013 Edward M. Kennedy Prize, and the 2011 Weissberger Award. He is the author of two poetry collections: War Reporter (Hanging Loose Press, 2013), which received the 2013 Fenton-Aldeburgh First Collection Prize and was shortlisted for the 2013 Forward Prize for Best First Collection; and Scarsdale (CB Editions, 2014). His libretto for Visitations, an opera composed by Jonathan Berger and directed by Rinde Eckert, was commissioned by the National Endowment for the Arts and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Visitations premiered at Bing Concert Hall at Stanford University in 2013, received its New York City premiere at the Prototype Festival in 2014, and will premiere at the Harris Theater in Chicago in 2016.  

Photo by David Bornfriend