Afro-Jamaican Poet Shara McCallum to Read at Smith College

Smith College will present a reading by poet Shara McCallum at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, December 4, in Stoddard Hall Auditorium. The reading is free and open to the public.

Born in Jamaica to Afro-Jamaican and Venezuelan parents, McCallum moved to the United States at the age of nine. She brings a new perspective to contemporary poetry, writing lyrical poems steeped in myth, legend and folklore. She is the author of “The Water Between Us,” winner of the Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize; “Song of Thieves”; “This Strange Land”; and “The Face of Water: New and Selected Poems.” Her poetry and personal essays have appeared widely in journals and have been reprinted in more than 20 anthologies and translated into Spanish and Romanian.

McCallum holds a doctoral degree in poetry and African-American and Caribbean literature. Her honors include an Academy of American Poets Prize, a Barbara Deming Memorial Fund Grant and a Fellowship in Poetry from the National Endowment for the Arts. McCallum lives with her family in Pennsylvania and teaches and directs the Stadler Center for Poetry at Bucknell University.

McCallum’s reading will be followed by a book sale and signing. For further information, contact Jennifer Blackburn at (413) 585-4891 of the Poetry Center. A limited number of assistive listening devices are available. If you’d like to reserve one, e-mail Jennifer Blackburn at jblackbu@smith.edu at least one day prior to the reading.

For disability access information or to request accommodations, call (413) 585-2407. To request a sign language interpreter specifically, call (413) 585-2071 (voice or TTY) or e-mail ODS@smith.edu. All requests must be made at least 10 days prior to the event.