Two Great Readings Next Thursday, April 30

It's the first annual English 695 fiction and poetry reading, where undergraduate creative writing students read work from their thesis projects. This reading is hosted by the Madison Review.

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Also on April 30: you're invited to join distinguished poet Martin Espada -- a UW-Madison alum known as "the" Latino poet of his generation, and "the" Pablo Neruda of North America --
for a poetry performance you will find at once illuminating, humorous, moving, and interdisciplinary.

The main event takes place at Pyle Center, on Thursday, 30 April at 7pm:
POETRY OF THE POLITICAL IMAGINATION:
A READING BY MARTIN ESPADA

There will also be two brownbag lectures by Espada: "The Redemption of Pablo Neruda," at noon on Thursday the 30th of April, and "Colonialism and the Poetry of Rebellion" in Puerto Rico, at noon on Friday the 1st of May. The brownbags will be in 5233 Mosse Humanities Bldng.

Espada's poetry breaks down conventional knowledge boundaries. It unites powerfully literature and history, political and social analysis, ethnic studies and area studies. It puts forth an "Americas" vision that encompasses New York and Puerto Rico, Wisconsin and Chile. It produces an experience that is at once edgy and humane, funny and dramatic. Espada's thirty honors include two Paterson Awards for Sustained Literary Achievement, citation as Pulitzer Prize Finalist, a John Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, and most recently, the National Hispanic Cultural Center Literary Award.

These events are co-sponsored by the Center for the Humanities, the Office of MultiCultural Arts Initiatives, the Department of History, LACIS (Latin American, Caribbean, and Iberian Studies), the Harvey Goldberg Center for the Study of Contemporary History, the Comparative US Cultures Cluster, and Chicana/o and Latina/o Studies.