Emma Lou Warner Thayne was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, and received her B.A. in English and her M.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Utah. She spent much of her professional career in teaching. She taught English in both Olympus Jr. High, Salt Lake City (1949-1950), and Murray High School, Murray, Utah (1950-1951). At the University of Utah, she worked as a part-time Associate Instructor in the Department of English and in the Division of Continuing Education (1946-1976), as well as a part-time Religion Instructor at the university's Institute of Religion (1983-1985). From 1977 to the present, she has worked on the Board of Directors for the Salt Lake City newspaper The Deseret News. She is also currently working as a regular columnist for Exponent II. Her publications include poetry collections such as Space in the Sage (Parliament Press, 1971), How Much for the Earth? (Signature Books, 1983), which received the Association for Mormon Letters award for poetry in 1985, and Things Happen, Poems of Survival (Signature Books, 1991). Her prose and poetry collections include With Love, Mother (Deseret Book Company, 1975), Once in Israel (Brigham Young University Press, 1980), which won the Best Book of Poems award in 1980 and the Association from Mormon Letters award for poetry in 1982, and All God's Critters got a Place in the Choir (with Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, Aspen Books, 1995). She has received numerous awards for her poetry, prose, and essays. Besides her talent in writing, she has excelled in tennis and ranked nationally Senior Women's Singles and Doubles. She is married to Melvin E. Thayne, and they are the parents of five daughters.