A Reading with Divagations and Conversation with Maureen McLane

Poet, memoirist, and critic Maureen N. McLane will read from her latest work as well as selected poems drawn from across her several collections -- including a sequence of poems inspired by fragments of Sappho. En route she will discuss why she writes, why poetry, how "notation" is one express route to attention, how poems can offer conversations and choruses as well as solos. After her reading and commentary, she will be in conversation with Professor Walt Hunter, following which they will open things up to the audience.

Raised in upstate New York, Maureen N. McLane is a poet, scholar, memoirist, critic, and educator. She has published eight books of poetry, including This Blue, Finalist for the National Book Award, and Some Say, Finalist for the Audre Lorde/Publishing Triangle Award and for The Believer Award in Poetry. Her most recent book of poems is What You Want (FSG; Penguin UK, 2023). She is also the author of an experimental hybrid of memoir and criticism, My Poets, a New York Times Notable Book, and has published two critical monographs on British romantic poetics. Her poems have recently appeared in London Review of Books, The Paris Review, Poesia (Italy), The New York Review of Books, and The Yale Review,and her work has been translated into French, Italian,Greek, Spanish, and Czech. She has published essays in Critical Inquiry, Representations, the LRB,The New York Times Book Review, and Public Books. Her latest book is My Poetics (Chicago, 2024), an adventure in poeticriticism. She is the Henry James Professor of English and American Letters at New York University. She has, as of yet, no tattoos.

English Department & Writing Program | Website | View More Events

Contact the organizers