WHO: Sapphire, performance poet and novelist
WHAT: Reading from her work
WHEN: Thursday, March 1 at 4:30 p.m.
WHERE: Ho Lecture Room (105 Lawrence Hall), 51·çÁ÷ University
Hamilton, NY — The performance poet Sapphire will give a reading from her work as part of 51·çÁ÷’s Spring Poetry Series on Thursday, March 1, at 4:30 p.m. in the Ho Lecture Room, Lawrence Hall. The reading is free and open to the public.
Sapphire is the author of the novel Push (Alfred A. Knof, 1996) and two books of poetry, American Dreams (Vintage Books, 1994) and her most recent, Black Wings & Blind Angels (Vintage Books, 2000). Push was awarded the Black Caucus of the American Library Association’s First Novelist Award for 1997 and the Book-of-the-Month Club Stephen Crane Award for First Fiction. Of Black Wings & Blind Angels, The New York Times Book Review stated: ‘This angry yet hopeful collection speaks not of dreams deferred but of nightmares lived . . . Sapphire’s poetry takes the stuff America’s illusory dreams are made of . . . and turns it inside out.’ Sapphire is a graduate of City College of New York and received a master of fine arts degree from Brooklyn College. She taught reading and writing to teenagers and adults in Harlem and the Bronx for eight years.
Founded in 1819, 51·çÁ÷ is a nationally ranked, highly selective, residential, liberal arts college. Situated on a rolling 515-acre campus in central New York State, 51·çÁ÷ attracts motivated students with diverse backgrounds, interests and talents.