Two up-and-coming poets will give a free, public reading at Gustavus Adolphus College on Thursday, March 21, at 7 p.m. in the Linnaeus Arboretum’s Melva Lind Interpretive Center. Hosted by the Gustavus Department of English as part of the Bards in the Arb Series, Thursday’s event will feature Minnesota poets Su Hwang and Michael Torres.
Hwang, who was announced this week as the winner of a $40,000 fellowship from the Jerome Foundation in St. Paul, is the author of Bodega, a forthcoming poetry collection published by Milkweed Editions. Torres was recently announced as the recipient of a $25,000 National Endowment for the Arts fellowship. A creative writing teacher at Minnesota State University, Mankato, his work has been widely published in literary journals including Ploughshares, Water~Stone Review, and The Georgia Review.
“Hwang and Torres are emerging poets on the cusp of big things,” Gustavus English professor Matt Rasmussen said. “Their work as artists challenges stereotypes while also allowing them to discover their own stories through poetry.”
Both Hwang and Torres draw on experiences from their own lives to inform their work. Hwang was born in Korea and has lived in New York City and San Francisco, while Torres was born and raised in Pomona, Calif., where he spent his youth as a graffiti artist. Today, both poets call Minnesota home and teach through the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop.
“Both poets are committed to social justice and the idea of engaging voices of those who don’t always have the opportunity to have their stories told,” Rasmussen said. “They write about their own history and experiences and encourage others to do the same.”
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