2021 Writers Week Line Up
February 13 & 16-20, 2021
44th Writers Week Crowdcast Festival
Rita Dove, Joy Harjo and Juan Felipe Herrera
2021 LA Review of Books (LARB) – UCR Department of Creative Writing
Lifetime Achievement Award Honorees, US Poet Laureates
Mike Davis
D. Charles Whitney Reader
Karen Tei Yamashita
Stephen Minot Lecture
44th UCR Writers Week Featured Writers
Millicent Borges Accardi, Kazim Ali, Francisco Aragón, Joseph Cassara, Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle, Camille T. Dungy, Carolyn Dunn, Steve Erickson, Kelli Jo Ford, Reyna Grande, Stephanie Elizondo Griest, Nalo Hopkinson, LeAnne Howe, John Jennings, Stephen Graham Jones, Laila Lalami, Brandy Nālani McDougall, Shin Yu Pai, Craig Santos Perez, Tommy Pico, Elizabeth Powell, Kamala Puligandla, Alison C. Rollins, Jane Smiley, Michael Torres, Melissa Valentine, Allison Benis White.
The 44th Writers Week 2021 is made possible by support from Ken Crocker, African Student Programs, Middle Eastern Student Center, UCR Department of English, UCR Department of Ethnic Studies, UCR Department of Theatre, Film, and Digital Production, California Center for Native Nations, Professor Alex Espinoza, Associate Professor, Tomás Rivera Endowed Chair of Creative Writing and English, Dr. Clifford Trafzer, Distinguished Professor of History and Rupert and Jeanette Henry Costo Chair in American Indian Affairs, UCR Arts, College of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences Dean’s Office, our generous sponsors through #UCRGivingTues, the Ratcliffe Family Creative Writing Endowment Fund and Los Angeles Review of Books.
Works by Writers Week authors will be available at UCR Campus Barnes & Noble online and at Cellar Door Books in Riverside.
Information: allisonh@ucr.edu writersweek@ucr.edu writersweek.ucr.edu
https://www.instagram.com/ucrwritersweek/
https://twitter.com/UCRWritersWeek
44th UCR Writers Week
@UCRWritersWeek
Saturday, February 13th | Pre-festival Events
Francisco Aragón
Director, Letras Latinas,
University of Notre Dame
Special Presentation for Puente Project
After Rubén (Red Hen Press, 2020)
Photo Credit: Craig Mailloux
Stephen Graham Jones
Special Presentation for Native American Student Programs (NASP)
The Only Good Indians
(Simon and Schuster, 2020)
UCR Palm Desert Low-Residency MFA
Photo Credit: Gary Isaacs
LeAnne Howe and James M. Fortier, cinematographer
Special Presentation On Documentary Film, “Searching for Sequoyah” for Native American Student Programs (NASP)
LeAnne Howe, Searching for Sequoyah
Savage Conversations (Coffee House Press, 2019)
Photo Credit: Unknown
Tuesday, February 16th
Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle
Even as We Breathe
(University Press of Kentucky, 2020)
Photo Credit: Terri Clark of Terri Clark Photography
Alison C. Rollins
Librarian / Poet
Library of Small Catastrophes
(Copper Canyon, 2019)
Photo Credit: Maya Ayanna Darasaw
Stephanie Elizondo Griest
All the Agents and Saints (UNC Press, paperback, 2020)
Photo Credit Alexander Devora
Elizabeth Powell
'Atomizer' (LSU Press, 2020)
Concerning the Holy Ghost’s Interpretation of J. Crew Catalogues
(Leaky Boot Press, 2019)
Photo Credit: Marion Ettlinger
Karen Tei Yamashita
Stephen Minot Lecture
Sansei & Sensibility
(Coffee House Press, 2020)
UC Santa Cruz
Photo Credit: Howard Boltz
Nalo Hopkinson
House of Whispers Vol 3: Watching the Watchers
(Neil Gaiman's "Sandman" Universe DC Comics, 2020)
UC Riverside
Photo Credit: DC Entertainment
Wednesday, February 17th
Steve Erickson
Conversations with Steve Erickson
(University Press of Mississippi, 2021)
UC Riverside
Photo Credit: Lori Precious
Kazim Ali
Northern Light: Power, Land, and the Memory of Water
(Milkweed Editions, 2021)
UC San Diego
The Field Office
Photo Credit: Jesse Sutton-Hough
Jane Smiley
Taking the Reins
(Knopf for Young Readers, 2020)
& Perestroika in Paris (Knopf for Young Readers, 2020)
Penguin Random House Speakers Bureau
UC Riverside
Photo Credit: Jane Smiley
LeAnne Howe
Savage Conversations
Famine Pots: The Choctaw Irish Gift Exchange 1847-Present, Michigan State University Press (2020)
When The Light of The World Was Subdued, Our Songs Came Through: A Norton Anthology of Native Nations Poetry (2020)
Searching for Sequoyah (forthcoming documentary film)
University of Georgia
Photo Credit: Unknown
Camille T. Dungy
Poetry Editor, Orion Magazine
Guidebook to Relative Strangers (Norton, paperback, 2018)
Orion Magazine
Blue Flower Arts
Photo Credit: Beowulf Sheehan
Carolyn Dunn
Three Plays by Carolyn Dunn – The Frybread Queen, Soledad, and Three Sisters
(No Passport Press’ Dreaming the Americas Series, 2021)
Cal State LA
Photo Credit: Nashoba Dunn Anderson
Thursday, February 18th
Kamala Puligandla
Editor-in-Chief at Autostraddle.com
Zig Zags (Not A Cult, 2020)
You Can Vibe Me On My FemmePhone (Co-Conspirator Press, 2021)
Photo Credit: Laura Kaur
Melissa Valentine
The Names of All the Flowers: A Memoir
(The Feminist Press at CUNY, 2020)
Photo Credit: Ira James
Tommy Pico
Poetry Editor Catapult Magazine
FX show Reservation Dogs writer
Photo Credit: Niqui Carter
Laila Lalami
Contributing Editor, The Nation
Conditional Citizens: On Belonging in America (Knopf, 2020)
UC Riverside
Barnes & Nobles
The New York Times Magazine
Photo Credit: Jesse Dittmar
Mike Davis
D. Charles Whitney Reader
Contributing Editor, The Nation
Set the Night on Fire: LA in the Sixties
(Verso, 2020)
The Nation
UC Riverside
Photo Credit: Cassandra Davis
John Jennings
After the Rain
(Abrams Comic Arts – Megascope, 2021)
UC Riverside
Photo Credit: Tarji Smedley
Friday, February 19th
Writers Resist Reading
Writers Resist Riverside: in collaboration with Pen America
Session 1: 1:00pm PST
Craig Santos Perez
Editor, Essayist, Poet
New Oceania Literary Series Editor
Habitat Threshold
(Omnidawn Publishing, 2020)
Photo Credit: Hannah Ensor
Brandy Nālani McDougall
Editor, Critical Essayist, Poet
Finding Meaning: Kaona and Contemporary Hawaiian Literature (University of Arizona Press, 2016)
The Salt Wind (Kuleana 'Ōiwi Press)
Photo Credit: Craig Santos Perez
Closing event of the UCR-hosted festival – Lifetime Achievement Award Ceremony
2021 LA Review of Books (LARB) – UCR Department of Creative Writing
Lifetime Achievement Award Honorees, US Poet Laureates
Rita Dove
2021 LA Review of Books (LARB) – UCR Department of Creative Writing Lifetime Achievement Award Honorees, US Poet Laureate, Poet Laureate of the Virginia Commonwealth
Collected Poems 1974-2004
(W.W. Norton, 2016)
The Penguin Anthology of Twentieth-Century American Poetry
(Penguin, 2011)
University of Virginia
Library of Congress
Photo Credit: Fred Viebahn
Joy Harjo
2021 LA Review of Books (LARB) – UCR Department of Creative Writing Lifetime Achievement Award Honoree, US Poet Laureate
An American Sunrise (Norton, 2019)
When the Light of the World was Subdued (Norton, 2020)
Blue Flower Arts
Library of Congress
Photo Credit: Matika Wilbur
Juan Felipe Herrera
2021 LA Review of Books (LARB) – UCR Department of Creative Writing Lifetime Achievement Award Honoree, US Poet Laureate, California Poet Laureate
Every Day We Get More Illegal
(City Lights, 2020)
187 Reasons Mexicanos Can't Cross The Border: Undocuments 1971-2007
(City Lights, 2007)
UCR Emeritus Professor of Creative Writing
Blue Flower Arts
Library of Congress
Photo Credit: Carlos Puma
Saturday, February 20th
Post-festival ticketed celebration with our Lifetime Achievement Award partner LA Review of Books Learn more
2021 LA Review of Books (LARB) – UCR Department of Creative Writing
Lifetime Achievement Award Honorees, US Poet Laureates
Rita Dove
2021 LA Review of Books (LARB) – UCR Department of Creative Writing Lifetime Achievement Award Honorees, US Poet Laureate, Poet Laureate of the Virginia Commonwealth
Collected Poems 1974-2004
(W.W. Norton, 2016)
The Penguin Anthology of Twentieth-Century American Poetry
(Penguin, 2011)
University of Virginia
Library of Congress
Photo Credit: Fred Viebahn
Joy Harjo
2021 LA Review of Books (LARB) – UCR Department of Creative Writing Lifetime Achievement Award Honoree, US Poet Laureate
An American Sunrise (Norton, 2019)
When the Light of the World was Subdued (Norton, 2020)
Blue Flower Arts
Library of Congress
Photo Credit: Matika Wilbur
Juan Felipe Herrera
2021 LA Review of Books (LARB) – UCR Department of Creative Writing Lifetime Achievement Award Honoree, US Poet Laureate, California Poet Laureate
Every Day We Get More Illegal
(City Lights, 2020)
187 Reasons Mexicanos Can't Cross The Border: Undocuments 1971-2007
(City Lights, 2007)
UCR Emeritus Professor of Creative Writing
Blue Flower Arts
Library of Congress
Photo Credit: Carlos Puma