Bishop Centenary at Vassar

POUGHKEEPSIE, NEW YORK: A major exhibit and symposium organized by the Vassar College Libraries will mark the centenary of poet Elizabeth Bishop, a 1934 Vassar graduate who earned the Pulitzer Prize and many other major U.S. literary honors before her death in 1979. Central to these upcoming events are the unmatched Elizabeth Bishop Papers housed at the college’s Archives and Special Collections Library.

For the exhibit, "From the Archive: Discovering Elizabeth Bishop", running August 30 through December 15, 2011, in Thompson Memorial Library, curator Ronald Patkus, asked ten Elizabeth Bishop scholars and editors to select items from Vassar’s Bishop collection that were important to their writing about the poet. These artifacts include a composition book that Bishop used in 1934 right after graduating from college and early drafts of the poems "12 O’Clock News" and "Homesickness".

At the September 24th symposium in Taylor Hall, Thomas Travisano will moderate a morning discussion “On Editing Bishop,” with panelists Alice Quinn, Lloyd Schwartz, Saskia Hamilton, and Joelle Biele. Barbara Page will moderate an afternoon discussion “On Teaching Bishop” with panelists Beth Spires, Lorrie Goldensohn, and Jane Shore. The symposium culminates with a keynote address by former U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky, who will also read his new poem dedicated to Vassar’s sesquicentennial and commissioned by the college for the occasion.

For more information, contact jekosmacher@vassar.edu.

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Another reading in honor of the Bishop centenary will take place in Worcester, Massachusetts, on August 13th, and will feature Robert Pinsky and Charles Simic. For more details about this and other events, visit the EB100 blog.