Poet Kaveh Akbar Kicks Off 2017 True Lit Festival

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Poet Kaveh Akbar

The University of Arkansas Program in Creative Writing and Translation is proud to host award-winning Iranian American poet Kaveh Akbar as the 2017 Arkansas International Featured Reader. Akbar's reading will kick off this year's True Lit Fayetteville Literary Festival. It takes place at 2 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 22, in the Fayetteville Public Library and is open to the public. No advance tickets are required.

"Kaveh Akbar is one of the most dynamic young poets writing today. His poetry can be found in some of the best journals and magazines worldwide, and we were thrilled to feature him in the second issue of The Arkansas International," said Zachary Harrod, creative writing M.F.A. student and poetry editor of the journal. "As our first Arkansas International Featured Reader, Kaveh represents what really excites our editorial board about literature—how it can be both intensely personal and also culturally, globally aware. This is going to be a great kick-off event for the True Lit Festival."

In 2016, Akbar won the prestigious Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation. His debut full-length collection, Calling a Wolf a Wolf, is just out with Alice James in the U.S. and Penguin in the UK, and his chapbook, Portrait of the Alcoholic, was published by Sibling Rivalry Press. His poems have appeared in The New Yorker, Poetry, The Nation, Tin House, Ploughshares, FIELD, Georgia Review, PBS NewsHour, Harvard Review, American Poetry Review, Narrative, The Poetry Review, AGNI, Poetry International, Best New Poets 2016, and elsewhere. Additional honors include a Pushcart Prize and the Lucille Medwick Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America. Born in Tehran, Iran, Akbar currently lives and teaches in Florida.

Akbar founded and edits Divedapper, a home for dialogues with the most vital voices in contemporary poetry. Previously, he ran The Quirk, a for-charity print literary journal. He has also served as Poetry Editor for BOOTH and Book Reviews Editor for the Southeast Review. Along with Gabrielle Calvocoressi, francine j. harris, and Jonathan Farmer, he starred on All Up in Your Ears, a monthly poetry podcast.

Akbar's reading is one of many events slated for Fayetteville's True Lit literary festival, which runs Oct. 22-29. Headline readers for the festival are Jennifer Holm, author of numerous books for children including Penny from Heaven, and James Dashner, famous for his Maze Runner series of books. A full schedule of events can be accessed online. The festival is organized by a number of local partners, including the Fayetteville Public Library, the Program in Creative Writing and Translation, and Fayetteville Public Schools.

"Our program has been a part of the True Lit Festival for four years now, bringing truly distinguished authors to Fayetteville for this wonderful celebration of literature and art. It's a true community effort, putting this festival together each year, and we're proud to contribute," said Davis McCombs, director of the U of A Program in Creative Writing and Translation.

Every other year, The Arkansas International Featured Reader series will bring an acclaimed author featured in the journal to Fayetteville for a public reading. Established in 2015, The Arkansas International is a biannual literary journal that seeks to publish and promote poetry, fiction, essays, comics and works in translation from the United States and abroad. It is run by graduate students in the creative writing MFA program.

The Arkansas International Featured Reader is made possible The Program in Creative Writing and Translation in conjunction with the J. William Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences, the Department of English, the Walton Family Foundation, and the James E. and Ellen Wadley Roper Professorship in Creative Writing.

Founded in 1966, the University of Arkansas Program in Creative Writing and Translation in the J. William Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences consistently ranks in the top 40 MFA programs nationwide, according to Poets & Writers magazine. The Atlantic Monthly named the U of A among the "Top Five Most Innovative" MFA programs in the nation. Noteworthy graduates include Barry Hannah, C.D. Wright, Lucinda Roy and Nic Pizzolatto.