Reading by Renowned Poet Claudia Rankine

The Program in Creative Writing and Translation is proud to announce our 2016 Distinguished Reader, renowned poet and author Claudia Rankine. Rankine will give a free reading of her poetry at 7pm, October 27. The event is part of the True Lit Fayetteville Literary Festival and will be held at the Fayetteville Public Library.

The reading is open to the public. No advance tickets are required.

Rankine is the author of five collections of poetry, including Don’t Let Me Be Lonely and Nothing in Nature is Private. Her most recent volume, Citizen: An American Lyric, won both critical and popular acclaim and has become a touchstone in the recent national debates about race. The book won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry, where it gained the distinction of being the first book ever to be nominated in both the poetry and criticism categories. Other awards for the collection include the NAACP Award, the PEN Open Book Award and the PEN Literary Award. It was a finalist for the 2014 National Book Award.

Rankine was recently awarded a 2016 MacArthur "genius grant." Among her other many honors are fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Academy of American Poets and the Lannan Foundation. In 2014, she was awarded the $50,000 Poets & Writers Jackson Poetry Prize, which honors an American poet of exceptional talent who deserves greater recognition.

In addition to her poetry, Rankine has authored plays, edited anthologies, and collaborated in video productions. Her work has been described as crossing genres, but its effect is less a conscious rejection of boundaries than a willingness to let expression find the form it needs. 

She teaches at the University of Southern California, where she is the Aerol Arnold Chair in the Department of English.

Rankine’s reading is one of many events slated for Fayetteville’s True Lit literary festival, Oct. 17-27, which also features an author talk by Newbery award-winning writer Louis Sachar. The festival is organized by numerous local partners, including the Fayetteville Public Library and Fayetteville Public Schools. 

The Program in Creative Writing and Translation Distinguished Readers Series is made possible by the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences, the Department of English, the Walton Family Foundation, and the James E. and Ellen Wadley Roper Professorship in Creative Writing, with special thanks to the Fayetteville Public Library and the many partners and sponsors who plan the True Lit festival each year.