Peter Roberts

Peter Roberts grew up near Pittsburgh, and earned a BS in mathematics at the University of Pittsburgh. He currently lives in central Ohio. Over the past thirty years or so, he has had poems and stories published in various magazines & online journals, including Asimov's, Daily Science Fiction, Star*Line, Nature, Astropoetica, Ars Medica, Redstone Science Fiction, Abyss & Apex, Bitter Oleander, Illumen, Poetry Salzburg Review, The South Carolina Review, Lilliput Review, Café Irreal, Poem, Lullaby Hearse, The Wisconsin Review, The William and Mary Review, Small Pond, New York Quarterly, Confrontation, and in the anthologies Poetic Voices Without Borders and Futures from Nature.

Get to know Peter...

Birthdate? 1952

When did you start writing? My sophomore year of high school. I was strongly influenced by an English teacher who encouraged me to explore outside the usual high school fare. Shortly thereafter I met a couple of like-minded fellow students, and we encouraged and critiqued each other's writing for a couple of years.

When and what and where did you first get published? My very first publication was a poem in my high school literary magazine, during my junior year, but I consider that to be part of my juvenilia. My first mature publication was a haiku in a little magazine called Hyacinths & Biscuits, in 1974.

What themes do you like to write about? Much of my writing seems to be about death, abstract ideas (especially mathematical ones), and the future, but I certainly don't limit myself to those areas.

What books and/or stories have most resonated with you as an author? Why? How do these stories and their characters find expression in your work? I've always been a voracious reader, and much of what I've read has influenced my writing, so I don't think I can give an adequate answer in just a few words. I will say that some of my earliest influences were e.e. cummings, Theodore Sturgeon, Lyn Lifshin, H.P. Lovecraft, Gary Snyder, & Ray Bradbury.