Self-portrait taken on June 15, 2012 along Aldrich Avenue in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

RAYMOND LUCZAK (pronounced as written but with a silent "c") is perhaps best known for his books, films, and plays. He was raised in Ironwood, a small mining town in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. Number seven in a family of nine children, he lost much of his hearing due to double pneumonia at the age of seven months. After high school graduation, Luczak went on to Gallaudet University, in Washington, DC, where he earned a B.A. in English, graduating magna cum laude. He learned American Sign Language (ASL) and became involved with the deaf community, and won numerous scholarships in recognition of his writing, including the Ritz-Paris Hemingway Scholarship. He took various writing courses at other schools in the area, which culminated in winning a place in the Jenny McKean Moore Fiction Workshop at the George Washington University. In 1988, he moved to New York City. In short order, his play Snooty won first place in the New York Deaf Theater’s 1990 Samuel Edwards Deaf Playwrights Competition, and his essay "Notes of a Deaf Gay Writer" won acceptance as a cover story for Christopher Street magazine. Soon after Alyson Publications asked him to edit Eyes of Desire: A Deaf Gay & Lesbian Reader, which, after its appearance in June 1993, eventually won two Lambda Literary Award nominations (Best Lesbian and Gay Anthology, and Best Small Press Book). In January 1996, Deaf Life Press brought out his first book of poems, St. Michael's Fall. In July 2002, the Tactile Mind Press brought out two of his new books: Silence is a Four-Letter Word: On Art & Deafness and This Way to the Acorns: Poems. His play, Snooty: A Comedy, was published as a book by the Tactile Mind Press in February 2004. His first novel Men with Their Hands won a first-prize award from the Arch and Bruce Brown Foundation for Full-Length Fiction 2003 in the spring of 2004. The book has gone on to win first place in the Project: QueerLit 2006 Contest; Rebel Satori Press published it as part of their Queer Mojo imprint in November 2009. A Midsummer Night's Press brought out his third collection of poems Mute in February 2010. Hot Off The published a very limited edition (10 copies only!) of his 12th title Notes of a Deaf Gay Writer: 20 Years Later; it is now available as an ebook for the iPad and the Kindle. Sibling Rivalry Press brought out his fourth poetry collection Road Work Ahead in March 2011; they will publish his next collection How to Kill Poetry in March 2013. He has just finished editingAmong the Leaves: Queer Male Poets on the Midwestern Experience for Squares & Rebels will bring out in October 2012. His work has appeared in various anthologies and periodicals, including Men on Men 4 (ed. Stambolian; NAL/Dutton), No Walls of Stone (ed. Jepson; Gallaudet University Press), Not the Only One (ed. Grima; Alyson), Staring Back (ed. Fries; Plume), The Deaf Way II Anthology (ed. Stremlau; Gallaudet University Press), and Quickies 3 (ed. Johnstone; Arsenal Pulp). His stories, interviews, essays, poems, and reviews have also appeared in diverse places such as BLOOM, TheaterWeek, Art & Understanding, Silent News, The Ragged Edge, The Dramatists Guild Quarterly, Handwave, Deaf Arts UK, Out, The Tactile Mind, Clerc Scar, and Van Gogh's Ear. He's had poems accepted by Crab Orchard Review, The Upstart Crow, The Brooklyn Review, Ganymede, Pegasus, The Hazmat Review, Poetry Motel, Byline Magazine, and other places. His short story "Interpretations," which first appeared in BLOOM, has been included in Steve Berman's anthology Best Gay Short Stories 2008 (Lethe Press). Nineteen of Luczak’s stage plays have been workshopped or produced in three countries: The Rake, Six Women in Search of a Perfect Play, Daffodils, This, Interpretations, Among Fathers, Hippos & Giraffes, Doogle, Whispers of a Savage Sort, and Snooty. The latter two were workshopped respectively at the New American Deaf Play Creators Festival and at the Worldwide and National Deaf Theater Conference; Snooty was subsequently produced in Los Angeles and Chicago. His play Among Fathers was workshopped under the Other Voices Program at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles. His next effort A Pair of Hands: Deaf Gay Monologues, opened at the HERE Theater in June 2002 in New York City; the play consisted of two one-acts: Hippos & Giraffes and Interpretations. Illuminations Arts produced his full-length play Love in My Veins in Houston in December 2003; Nicu's Spoon, based in New York, went on to mount a staged reading of the play in November 2005. He directed his stage adaptation of Beauty & The Beast, which was a sell-out hit at the California School for the Deaf - Fremont in March 2004. He also taught playwriting at the National Theater of the Deaf as part of their Actors' Academy in August 2004 and Shape as part of their National Deaf Theater Academy in August 2005. His thirteenth play In Love and Lust We Trust was performed at Jacksons Lane Theater in London later that same month. His next two one-acts, Unconditional Murder and Unhappily Ever After, were performed as Un: 2 Short Plays about Love in February 2009. Deaf Blender Theatre has produced his play, That Chair was My Wife, in the Minnesota Fringe Festival '09. Gallaudet University Press brought out a collection of his full-length plays Whispers of a Savage Sort and Other Plays about the Deaf American Experience in September 2009. Bridge Productions presented staged readings of his next two plays Jackhammer and The Darkest Room in the House in March 2010. His most recent stage effort, Pete Linden, Etc., was given a staged reading at the National Technical Institute of the Deaf (NTID) in September 2010. Ghosted, his debut directorial feature, is now nearing its completion in post production. His short films include Some Women and Hippos & Giraffes, which he wrote and produced (Tim Chamberlain directed). His first direct-to-DVD project was the hugely successful Manny ASL: Stories in American Sign Language, featuring the renowned ASL storyteller Manny Hernandez. The DVD of his first full-length documentary Guy Wonder: Stories & Artwork came out in December 2003. His second DVD documentary was called Nathie: No Hand-Me-Downs, focusing on Nathie Marbury, a fabulous storyteller and legend from Austin, TX, which came out in May 2005. His next DVD project, a collaboration with Manny Hernandez called Manny: ASL for a Better Life, is expected to come out sometime in 2013. In September 2005, he relocated to Minneapolis, where he's become busier than ever! He is currently the editor of the new literary fiction journal Jonathan. Its first issue will appear on December 6, 2012.