N. Scott Momaday Biography

N. Scott Momaday

As a writer Navarre Scott Momaday draws from the "pan-Indian experience" that was his childhood. His father was a Kiowa Indian and his mother was of Cherokee ancestry; both taught on southwestern reservations while Momaday was growing up. Momaday himself taught on an Apache reservation before earning a doctorate in English literature at Stanford. He identifies as a poet but became known when his debut novel House Made of Dawn won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1969. He has also published plays, essays, literary history, and a memoir, and as a painter and etcher has illustrated some of his recent works. Professor Momaday has taught English and creative writing since 1963.