One-time classmates and longtime friends, poets Tina Chang and Tracy K. Smith, draw upon years of private correspondence, exploring how their intimate exchange has shaped their work, illuminated their individual creative processes, and added meaning to their understanding of the writer’s life.

Brooklyn Poet Laureate Tina Chang is the author of the poetry collections Half-Lit Houses (2004) and Of Gods & Strangers (2011). The recipient of awards from the Academy of American Poets, the New York Foundation for the Arts, and Poets & Writers, among others, she teaches poetry at Sarah Lawrence College and is a member of the international writing faculty at the City University of Hong Kong, the first low-residency MFA program to be established in Asia.

Whiting Award winner Tracy K. Smith has published  the critically acclaimed memoir Ordinary Light (Knopf, 2015) and three books of poetry. Her collection Life on Mars won the 2012 Pulitzer Prize;Duende received the 2006 James Laughlin Award from the Academy of American Poets and an Essence Literary Award; and The Body’s Question was selected by Kevin Young for the 2002 Cave Canem Poetry Prize. A recipient of the Academy of American Poets’ Academy Fellowship for distinguished poetic achievement, Smith is the Director of Princeton University’s Creative Writing Program.

General Admission $10 / Students $5 in advance or at the door. Reservations recommended: seating limited.

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