NOTED POETS TO APPEAR AT ROBERT FROST 150th ANNIVERSARY PUBLIC EVENTS

Frost Society, San Diego Library Collaborating for 2024 Sesquicentennial

SAN DIEGO, Dec. 13, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Ten of the nation's most distinguished poets will gather in San Diego in March 2024 to mark the 150^th birthday of Robert Frost, America's most iconic poet and winner of four Pulitzer Prizes for books containing such timeless works as "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," "Mending Wall," and "The Road Not Taken."

Organized by the San Diego-based Robert Frost Society and the Library Foundation SD, the March 20-25 Sesquicentennial event will feature Pulitzer Prize winner Tracy K. Smith, Ruth Lilly Prize Winner Allison Joseph, Pulitzer Price Finalist Bruce Weigl, and Guggenheim Fellowship winner Jay Parini, who will read and discuss their poems and Frost in free public sessions.

The conference is expected to attract an international cohort of poets, scholars, and critics to San Diego to celebrate the anniversary of the March 26, 1874 birth of Frost, a native Californian who became America's most widely beloved poet. Prior to afternoon and evening poetry readings open to the public, registered conference attendees will participate in three days of poetry workshops, lectures and roundtable discussions exploring Frost's extensive body of work and the craft of poetry.

"We are thrilled to be bringing together such an accomplished and diverse group of Frost devotees to our home base in San Diego," said Robert Bernard Hass, executive director of The Robert Frost Society. "Robert Frost was self-consciously a poet for all people, and our hope is that the celebration will highlight the art of poetry as the greatest medium for cultivating intercultural understanding and empathy."

Noted poets also confirmed to attend the event include San Diego Poet Laureate Jason Magabo, San Diego performance artist Karla Cordero, Poet's Prize finalist David Yezzi, Ohio Poet Laureate Amit Majmudar and Cave Canem Award winner Ruth Ellen Kocher. "The Greater San Diego region itself contains an unusual wealth of poets, writer's groups and workshops," Hass pointed out. "We will be excited to welcome their participation as well as that of students from the area's many colleges and universities."

The Robert Frost Society, formed in 1978 to sustain Frost's legacy and facilitate a broad appreciation for the humanities, established its permanent home in 2019 at the San Diego Central Library. The project was initiated by San Diego area writer and poet Jim Hurley and co-led by Hass and Hurley. Initial supporters included San Diego icon Malin Burnham and noted San Diego businessmen Mel Katz and Art Flaming. Subsequent leadership from Library Foundation CEO Patrick Stewart, San Diego educational leader Mary Walshok, commercial real estate expert Craig Evanco, and emerita Chancellor of San Diego Colleges Constance Carroll enabled the Frost Society to offer key Sesquicentennial events to the public at no cost.

"That San Diego's most influential civic and educational leaders have coalesced behind this stellar event is no surprise," said Patrick Stewart, CEO of Library Foundation SD. "With their ideas and support, The Robert Frost Society has attracted a world-class gathering of our country's finest poets to commemorate one of literature's greatest figures in America's finest city."

Registration and event information will be available by January 15, 2024 via robertfrostsociety.org

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SOURCE The Robert Frost Society