Past Events

Archive 2003-2004

October 29

Derek Walcott
Reading 4:00 p.m. ICC Auditorium

Born in Saint Lucia, the West Indies, Derek Walcott is one of the signal poets of his generation, whose poetry, plays, and essays have gained a worldwide audience, and awards such as the MacArthur "genius" grant, an Obie, and in 1992, the Nobel Prize. His poetry books include Tiepolo's Hound and Omeros, a book of essays, What the Twilight Says, and a play, The Oddyssey: A Stage Version. Derek Walcott is this year's Distinguished Reader for both the Georgetown Lannan Series and the Graduate School.

November 6

Robert Minhinnick
Reading 8 p.m. McNeir Auditorium

Robert Minhinnick, named "the leading Welsh poet of his generation" (The Sunday Times), has produced eight collections of poetry, several books on the environment in Wales, and essays on Albania, California, Brazil, and the "absurd zones" of the world. Called a combination of Martin Amis and Bruce Chatwin, Minhinnick is editor of the Poetry Wales magazine, whose latest column - and his reading at Georgetown - will showcase the work of Dylan Thomas.

November 20

Tracie Morris / Edwin Torres
Seminar: 5:30 p.m. 450 ICC • Reading: 8:00 p.m. Bulldog Alley, in the Leavy Center

Tracie Morris is a daring multi-disciplinary performer, a "mysical poet" who has worked in theater, dance, music, and film. and won awards from the National Haiku Slam Championship and the Asian Cultural Council. She has toured extensively throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, Africa and Asia, participated in a dozen recording projects, and been anthologized in Aloud: Voices from the Nuyorican Cafe and The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry and Soul. Her latest books are Intermission and Chap-T-her Woman.

Edwin Torres is a bilingual poet, rooted in the languages of sight and sound, text and performance. His work mingles poetry with vocal and physical imporvisation, sound elements and visual theater, landscapes that exist beyond language. He has appeared on MTC's Spoken Word Unplgged and in Rolling Stone Magazine; his CD Holy Kid was played at the Whitney Museum; his books include The All-Union Day of the Shock Worker and Onamalingua: Noise Songs and Poetry.

November 21-22

Bobby McFerrin
November 21 Poetry Slam with Black Theatre Ensemble 8 p.m., Bulldog Alley, in the Leavy Center
November 22 Concert 8 p.m. McDonough Gym

Bobby McFerrin, called a "natural wonder of the music world," is a ten-time Grammy Award winner, and is renowned as a vocalist and musical innovator, conductor, collaborator (with Yo-Yo Ma, Chic Corea and others), and a passionate advocate for music education. German Critics call him Stimmunder: "wonder voice." McFerrin is holding collaborative workshops at Georgetown this fall, culminating in a concert and poetry slam.

January 26

Caroline Forché / Semezdin Mehmedinovic
Seminar: 5:30 p.m. 462 ICC • Reading 8:00 p.m. ICC Auditorium

Caroline Forché is renowned for her poems, translations, and anthologies, and for her committed advocacy for international human rights. A Yale Younger Poet and Lamont prize winner for her own poetry, she has produced the landmark anthology, Against Forgetting: Twentieth Century Poetry of Witness, and translations of the verse of Clarebel Alegria and Mahmoud Darwish. In 1998, she received the Hiroshima Foundation's Peace and Culture Award. Her new book of poems is Blue Hour.

Born in Bosnia, Semezdin Mehmedinovic is the author of five books, including Sarajevo Clues, his evocative depiction of Bosnia under siege, "widely considered... the best piece of writing" from Bosnia since the war (Washington Post). His new book, Nine Alexandrias, offers an incisive look at the post 9/11 American empire and particularly Washington, where he now works as a producer for Voice of America.

March 25

Carol Muske Dukes / Sam Hamill
Seminar: 5:30 p.m. 462 ICC • Reading: 8:00 p.m. ICC Auditorium

Carol Muske Dukes, whose elegent poetry "transforms the ordinary into the strange and the strange into the...otherworldly" (Library Journal), has just produced a seventh book of verse, Sparrow. She has published three novels and a series of essays entitled Married to the Icepick Killer: A poet in Hollywood. Among her honors are Pushcart Prizes, NEA and Guggenheim grants, and the Witter Bynner Fellowship.

Sam Hamill, the multi-talented poet, translator, essayist and editor, peace activist, and founder of Copper Canyon Press, is author of thirteen columes of poetry; his latest in Dumb Luck. He has translated work from Greek, Latin, Estonian, Japanese, and Chinese, taught in prisons for fouteen years, and recently initiated the fast-growing Poets Against the War Organization. He has won awards from the Guggenheim Foundation, Lila Wallace Fund, and the US-Japan Friendship Commission.

April 26

Heather McHugh's / David Rivard
Seminar 5:30 p.m. 462 ICC • Reading 8:00 p.m. ICC Auditorium

Heather McHugh's quick-shifting poetry has been praised for "articulate toughness," and for showing a "mind that makes language seem to think." Her many books of poetry, translation, and prose have won her wide acclaim, including finalist for the National book Award, the Griffin Prize, and the O.B. Hardison prize. Her new books include Euripedes's Cyclops (translation) and Eyeshot (poems). David Rivard's jazzy eclectic books of poetry have won the James Laughlin and Agnes Lynch Starrett prizes, and awards from the Poetry Society of America and he NEA. With "a storyteller's ear" and "an eye for gritty detail," his new book, Wise Poison, is praised for its "delicate wit and sheer poet nerve" (Publisher's Weekly). Somehow called a "Rastafarian Li Po whose daughter raises spring onions," he lives in Cambridge.