The Creative Writing MFA Reading Series presents CAConrad, an award-winning poet, playwright and artist. “Profoundly, their poems stand with life and against the brutality, violence and bigotry that permeate our culture,” wrote Sara Burant for OmniVerse. “It is a poetry at once of resistance and wonder.” Hailed as “a contemporary masterpiece” by Thurston Moore, Conrad’s collection, “The Book of Frank,” became their breakout publication, receiving wide acclaim. Anne Boyer called the collection a “desert island book,” while Maggie Nelson described it as “this generation’s ’Dream Songs.'”
Conrad will give a reading at 7:30 PM on Friday, March 8 in The Hemingway Center, followed by a book signing. Free and open to the public, the MFA Reading Series brings renowned writers to the Boise State campus each year.
Beginning in 1975, CAConrad worked with the ancient technologies of poetry and ritual. They authored nine books, including “AMANDA PARADISE: Resurrect Extinct Vibration” (Wave Books, 2021), which won the 2022 PEN Josephine Miles Award. They received a 2022 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, a Creative Capital grant, a Pew Fellowship, and a Lambda Award. They exhibit poems as art objects, with recent solo shows in Spain and Portugal, and their play “The Obituary Show,” was made into a film in 2022 by Augusto Cascales. UK Penguin published two of their books in 2023, and a new collection of poetry is forthcoming from Wave Books in 2024 titled “Listen to the Golden Boomerang Return.” Visit them online here.
You can view all upcoming creative writing MFA reading events on the events page here.