Gary Jackson & Yusef Komunyakaa

In this series, host and moderator Alexs Pate, University of Minnesota professor and author of Amistad, takes you on a journey into the consciousness of three luminary writers. These dynamic events feature the authors reading from their work and engaging in spirited dialogue with Pate about the state of the art of African American literature.

Winner of the 2009 Cave Canem Poetry Prize for his manuscript, Missing you, Metropolis, Gary Jackson was born and raised in Topeka, Kansas. He received his MFA in Poetry from the University of New Mexico in 2008 and his poems have appeared in Inscape, Magma, The Literary Bohemian and local chapbooks. Jackson’s Missing you, Metropolis is published by Greywolf Press and lauded
by critics such as Yusef Komunyakaa, who writes that the book “embodies and underscores a voice uniquely shaped and tuned for the 21st century. Playful, jaunty and highly serious, the collection is gauged by a sophisticated heart. Pathos breathes within and slightly underneath the visual comedy, and this quality is the true genius of Missing you, Metropolis.” Gary Jackson currently teaches English as a Second Language in Seoul, South Korea.

Yusef Komunyakaa is the critically acclaimed author of 14 books of poetry, including Copacetic and Neon Vernacular: New & Selected Poems 1977–1989, for which he received the Pulitzer Prize. His latest book of poems, Warhorses, was published in 2008. His prose is collected in Blues Notes: Essays, Interviews & Commentaries, and he co-edited The Jazz Poetry Anthology. In addition to the Pulitzer Prize, his honors include the 2004 Shelley Memorial Award, the 2001 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, the Hanes Poetry Prize and the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. He is Professor and Distinguished Senior Poet at New York University.

Cowles AuditoriumHubert H. Humphrey Center301 19th Ave SMinneapolis, MN  55455

--Friends of University Libraries and U of M students can receive up to two complimentary tickets by calling the Northrop Ticket Office.

Series Sponsors: The Givens Foundation for African American Literature, The Friends of the University of Minnesota Libraries, The University of Minnesota Urban Research and Outreach/Engagement Center, Cave Canem