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The work of the late Judith Ortiz Cofer (1952-2016) often reflected her Puerto Rican heritage and her childhood in New Jersey. A literary pioneer for Latina writers in the U.S., she wrote 17 books of poetry, fiction, essays, and memoir, and edited and contributed to many others. A beloved professor at the ...

The poet, critic, and translator John Ashbery, who died on September 3rd at age 90, won nearly every major writing award, including in a single year, the Pulitzer Prize, National Book Award, and National Book Critics Circle Award. Besides writing his more than two dozen books and teaching, he served as the New York State Poet Laureate from 2000 to 2003. An experimental poet, who began as a visual artist, he was influenced early on by the French surrealists and was known—despite his disd...

In the first part of this interview, Mississippi Poet Laureate (2012-16) and guest editor of Best American Poetry 2017, Natasha Trethewey talks about her work that deals with history, racism, and family, including her first creative non-fiction book, Beyond Katrina: A Meditat...

Olivia Stiffler always wanted to be a poet, but writing took a backseat to her family life. Decades later, while at a Savannah writing workshop, she met James Tolan (shown), a poet and English professor, who helped her envision her work as a complete collection. Olivia Stiffler and the late James Tolan discuss their unique mentorship and recount how James found her a publisher. They also talk about some of their similar experiences, including growing up in the Catholic Church and surviv...

We honor the Past American Voice of Conger Beasley Jr.(1940-2016). This author of fiction, poetry, essays and non-fiction covered various subjects, ranging from texts for the Sierra Club Guide to the history of the Lakota Sioux to the fictionalized life of Maurice Ravel. This show pulls from two archive interviews in 1990 and 1996, as well as some never-before aired segments, as he reads from his book,...

A journalist who worked for such publications as Esquire, New York Magazine, and MSNBC.com, Jeannette Walls turned to memoir for her first book, the 2005 international bestseller, The Glass Castle, now an August 2017 film. She discusses this book and her 2009 follow-up, ...

We look back on the life of novelist Kent Haruf (1943-2014), still a favorite writer of book clubs across the country. September 2017 marks the inaugural Kent Haruf Literary Celebration in Salida for this Colorado native, whose work often took place in the rural American high plains and reflected his own upbringing. In this archive interview, Haruf talks about his book, ...

Published in various anthologies and literary magazines, including New Letters as the Fiction Prize winner of 2004, Rachel Hall discusses her first book, a collection of interconnected short stories called Heirlooms. Chosen by Marge Piercy as the 2015 winner of the G.S. Sharat Chandra Prize for Short Fiction from BkMk Press, it is based on her...

In the second half of a conversation with Georgia State Poet Laureate (2012-present) Judson Mitcham talks in front of a WUGA audience in Athens, GA, about his two novels, The Sweet Everlasting and Sabbath Creek, both winners the Townsend Prize for fiction. Mitcham's voice is an important part of...

The author of eleven books of short stories and novels, Antonya Nelson appears as UMKC's 2015 Cockefair Chair Writer-in-Residence at the Kansas City Public Library. She talks about her most recent books: the novel Bound, which covers growing up in Wichita, Kansas during the reign of the BTK killer, as well as her 2014 collection of short stories, ...

Visiting Kansas City for the Midwest Poets Series, National Book Critics Circle Award winner Rodney Jones discusses what he learned about the use of language from the late writers and friends, Kent Haruf and C.D. Wright. He also reads from and talks about the shaping of his selected works, Salvation Blues: ...

While at the Woodneath Library Center, novelist Larry Watson reads from his tenth book, As Good As Gone. Though he grew up in North Dakota and is now teaching at Marquette University in Wisconsin, Watson has based much of his fiction in Montana and admits there are many similarities between his home state and the settings for his books. He reveals how cowboy movies from the early 196...

In this interview at the Kansas City Public Library, poet, editor, and Guggenheim Fellow Michelle Boisseau discusses her fifth book, Among the Gorgons. She reveals how her own aging shed new light on some of the Greek mythology that inspired the Tampa Review Poetry Prize-winning collection. Also a co-author of the textbook Writing Poems, now in its eighth edition, Boisseau talks about...

In the second part of this conversation, poet and "MacArthur genius" Edward Hirsch discusses how the sudden death of his son inspired his 2014 book Gabriel: A Poem, which was longlisted for the 2014 National Book Award and won the National Jewish Book Award. Though he had written elegiac poetry in the past, this book length poem proved especially difficult to create. Describ...

Novelist Whitney Terrell talks about his time being embedded with the military in Iraq, writing nonfiction for Slate Magazine and The Washington Post, and how the stories he he...