An Indigenous Australian poet has won a US literary prize worth $165,000 (£134,000). Ali Cobby Eckermann had been nominated for the Windham-Campbell prize, which is administered by Yale University. Eckermann is a member of the Stolen Generations, taken from her mother when she was a baby. Her mother was also removed from her parents as a child.

Eckermann is a Yankunytjatjara/Kokatha woman who was living in a caravan in Adelaide when she heard of her award. She said: “I want to accept this award on behalf of my grandmother who walked out of the Maralinga bombs [the British nuclear testing that occurred near Maralinga, South Australia, in the 50s and 60s to the great detriment of local Indigenous people] with her little children, and then my mother was taken from her – to my grandmother and my mother, who were so dignified in their pain. Life changed so dramatically for them, and they stayed really dignified and that’s the legacy they’ve given me.”

Talking of the impact of the prize, she told the Sydney Morning Herald: ''I'm living in a caravan now. I like my caravan, I live a very simple life. I am looking after my old adopted mother in Adelaide and I could not foresee that this would have happened. My son and grandsons are returning from Western Australia soon so it would be lovely to establish a place to enjoy my family and watch them grow instead of spending all my time going to them.'' 

Her debut poetry collection, Little Bit Long Time, was published by the Australian Poetry Centre as part of the New Poets series in 2009. She has described her award-winning 2015 collection Inside My Mother as an "emotional timeline" of the Stolen Generations. In her memoir Too Afraid to Cry, published in 2013, Eckermann related how she had been tricked away from her mother as a baby, repeating the trauma her mother had suffered when she was taken from her grandmother many years before. Eckermann, in turn, had to give her own child up for adoption.

She said: ''I like to think the prize recognises an honest truth around Stolen Generations, for writing around an emotional truth, not academic. I've learnt to embrace my emotional baggage and turn it into poetry.'' You can read her poem, ‘Thunder raining poison’ here.

This is the first time poets have been included among recipients of the Windham-Campbell prizes, with the Michigan-born poet Carolyn Forché also receiving a grant.