Self-portrait
Bill Cooper (born William Edwin Cooper, March 20, 1951 Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.A.), American academic, retired distinguished university professor and president emeritus of the University of Richmond (Virginia), and author of books and articles in cognitive science, international relations, and higher education. He was introduced to haikai in 1975, has been composing since 2009, published ten books of haiku and senryu, and won honors in both THF Touchstone Awards for Individual Haiku and for Distinguished Books, the HSA Merit Book Awards, the BHS David Cobb Haiku Awards, the Robert Spiess Awards, the Ginyu Ban’ya Natsuishi Prize, the Irish Haiku Society Competition, the San Francisco International Senryu Competition, the Tokutomi Haiku Contest, and the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival Haiku Invitational. Cooper served on the editorial board of Juxtapositions: Journal of Haiku Research and Scholarship (2014–2019) and as judge of the HSA Merit Book Awards (2022) and Brady Senryu Awards (2024). He has been a featured poet at Haiku Poets of Northern California and Haiku North America conferences, and in Tom Clausen’s Mann Library’s Daily Haiku feature. Cooper lives in Naples, Florida.
Note: This is an abstract of a longer biographical article to come.