Virginia Poet Laureate Emerita Luisa A. Igloria (2020β2022), author of Maps for Migrants and Ghosts (Co-winner, 2019 Crab Orchard Open Poetry Prize) and The Buddha Wonders If She Is Having a Mid-life Crisis (2018), is the keynote speaker for 91΄σΙρβs Academic and Creative Excellence (ACE) Festival.
Igloria will deliver a keynote βreading addressβ titled βWhat Poetry Offers: More Than Feelingβ on Wednesday, April 19, 2023 from 7β8 p.m. in Lehman Auditorium and. The address invites audiences to consider how language, technique, practice and revision can be used to affect the meaning and impact of a poem. The event is open to the public and includes a reception and book signing from 8β9 p.m. in the Brunk Maust Lounge in the Campus Center. Three collections of Igloriaβs poetry will be for sale.
Igloria teaches at Old Dominion University where she is a Louis I. Jaffe professor of English and creative writing in the MFA Program, which she directed from 2009β2015. She also leads workshops for and is a member of the board of The Muse Writers Center in Norfolk, Virginia.
Igloria is the inaugural recipient of the 2015 Resurgence Poetry Prize (U.K.), the worldβs first major award for ecopoetry; a panel headed by former U.K. Poet Laureate Andrew Motion selected her for the prize. In July 2020, she was appointed Poet Laureate of the Commonwealth of Virginia, serving a two-year term. In April 2021, she received one of 23 Poet Laureate Fellowships from the Academy of American Poets to support a program of public poetry projects.
Find Luisa A. Igloria on social media:
- Website:
- Facebook:
- Instagram: @poetslizard
- Twitter: @ThePoetsLizard
Igloriaβs visit is being hosted by the Provostβs Office. The ACE Festival is generously sponsored by these partnering businesses:
