MFA Reading Series: D.A. Powell

The MFA Reading series presents award-wining poet D. A. Powell, a writer who “has crafted innovative work that blends the mythology of gay culture with the idiosyncrasies of his own voice and experience” (The New Yorker). The New York Times Book Review said of Powell: “No accessible poet of his generation is half as original, and no poet as original is this accessible.”

Powell will give a reading at 7:30 PM on Friday, September 27 in The Hemingway Center. Free and open to the public, the MFA Reading Series brings renowned writers to the Boise State campus each year.

The author of five collections, D.A. Powell received the National Book Critics Circle Award in poetry for his book, “Useless Landscape, or A Guide for Boys.” Powell’s most recent book, “Repast: Tea, Lunch & Cocktails” comprises a reissue of his first three collections with an introduction by novelist David Leavitt. The New Yorker called “Repast” “a jagged, one-of-a-kind opus, which endures both as a personal testimony and as the rare poetic work that manages to capture the ineffable on the page.” Powell’s honors include the Kingsley Tufts Prize in Poetry, the Shelley Memorial Prize from the Poetry Society of America, and the John Updike Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, as well as fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation. A former Briggs-Copeland Lecturer in Poetry at Harvard University, Powell has taught at Stanford, Columbia, University of Texas at Austin, University of Iowa’s Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and Davidson College. A Professor at University of San Francisco, Powell lives in San Francisco.