Ninth Letter is the award-winning literary arts journal edited and produced by the Creative Writing Program at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Join Ninth Letter editor Jodee Stanley, alumna Jessica Tanck, and poet Kathy Fagan for an immersive virtual event featuring a poetry reading and a discussion. Register here.
We are thrilled to announce that Michael Kleber-Diggs is the winner of the 2020 Max Ritvo Poetry Prize. His manuscript Worldly Things was selected by judge Henri Cole and will be published in June 2021. In addition to publication, Kleber-Diggs will receive $10,000.
Michael Kleber-Diggs was born and raised in Kansas and now lives in St. Paul, Minnesota. His work has appeared in Lit Hub, the Rumpus, Rain Taxi, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Water~Stone Review, Midway Review, North Dakota Quarterly and a few anthologies. Kleber-Diggs teaches poetry and creative non-fiction through the Minnesota Prison Writers Workshop. Worldly Things…
Michael Kleber-Diggs’s debut collection of poems, Worldly Things, won the 2020 Max Ritvo Poetry Prize. He was born and raised in Kansas and now lives in St. Paul, Minnesota. His work has appeared in Lit Hub, the Rumpus, Rain Taxi, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Water~Stone Review, Midway Review, North Dakota Quarterly and a few anthologies. Michael teaches poetry and creative non-fiction through the Minnesota Prison Writers Workshop.
Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of Braiding Sweetgrass, will present at Western Landowners Alliance’s “Beyond Fencelines: Women in Ranching Confluence 2020.” Register for the virtual gathering here.
Point Reyes Books hosts Aimee Nezhukumatathil and Elena Passarello in conversation about Aimee’s new book, World of Wonders. This event will be streamed on Crowdcast. Register here.
This fall, the Asian American Writers’ Workshop is celebrating the art of the essay. Featuring longtime poets and fiction writers with debut essay collections out this year, this conversation will take an intersectional look at Asian American identity, genre, gender, race, publishing, and the way the essay form allows writers to dance, dodge, spar, and move through time and nature to tell important stories. Featuring Cathy Park Hong, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, and Sejal Shah, and moderated by Piyali Bhattacharya. RSVP here.
Ithaca College hosts Aimee Nezhukumatathil for their Distinguished Visiting Writers Series. More details here.
Portland Book Festival hosts a writing workshop taught by Aimee Nezhukumatathil. Lony Haley-Nelson notes: “Wonder is valuable…because it leads us to learn and remember.” Using the language and vocabulary of myth, folklore, science, and natural history as inspiration for poems, this generative workshop will help you jump-start the blank page in front of you. Limited to 40 students; register here.
Portland Book Festival hosts a cross-genre discussion of environmental justice and the inseparableness of the climate crisis and economic inequality, featuring John Freeman, editor of Tales of Two Planets and author of The Park. John will be in conversation with Aimee Nezhukumatathil, acclaimed poet (Oceanic) and author of the illustrated essay collection about the natural world and the way its inhabitants can teach, support, and inspire us, World of Wonders; and Kawai Strong Washburn, whose debut novel is Sharks in the Time of Saviors, in which supernatural events force a family to reckon with the meaning of heritage and the cost of survival. RSVP here.
The Kirkus Prize awards ceremony will be held on November 5th, from 5 to 7pm (awards announced at 6), and Aimee Nezhukumatathil’s World of Wonders is a finalist in the Nonfiction category! The ceremony will be livestreamed to YouTube.
