FARMINGTON, ME (November 6, 2018)—Award-winning poets Mia Ayumi Malhotra and Ellen Doré Watson will be launching new books of poetry at the upcoming UMF Visiting Writers Series, 7:30 p.m., Thursday, Nov. 8, in The Landing in the UMF Olsen Student Center. It will be followed by a meet and greet and book signing. The reading is free and open to the public.
This reading is sponsored by the University of Maine at Farmington Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program in conjunction with Alice James Books and in celebration of the Alice James Award.
Mia Ayumi Malhotra, winner of the 2017 Alice James Award, is the author of ISAKO ISAKO (forthcoming September 2018). A Pushcart Prize nominee and a founding editor of Lantern Review, she has received fellowships from the VONA/Voices Writing Workshop and Kundiman, an organization dedicated to the cultivation of Asian American writing.
Her poems have appeared in numerous literary journals and anthologies, including Indiana Review, The Greensboro Review, Best New Poets, and DISMANTLE: An Anthology of Writing from the VONA/Voices Writing Workshop. She holds a BA from Stanford University and an MFA from the University of Washington.
Ellen Doré Watson is the author of five full-length collections of poems, most recently, pray me stay eager, from Alice James Books. Earlier works include Dogged Hearts and This Sharpening, from Tupelo Press and We Live in Bodies and Ladder Music, winner of the New England/New York award, both from Alice James Books.
Watson’s journal appearances include APR, Tin House, Orion, Field, Ploughshares and The New Yorker. Among her honors are a Rona Jaffe Writers Award, fellowships to the MacDowell Colony and to Yaddo, and a National Endowment for the Arts Translation Fellowship.
She serves as poetry and translation editor of The Massachusetts Review and core faculty at Drew University’s Low-Residency Master of Fine Arts in Poetry and Translation.
More Information on the UMF Creative Writing Program
As the only Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program in the state of Maine and one of only three in all of New England, the UMF program invites students to work with faculty, who are practicing writers, in workshop-style classes to discover and develop their writing strengths in the genres of poetry, fiction, and non-fiction. Small classes, an emphasis on individual conferencing, and the development of a writing portfolio allow students to see themselves as artists and refine their writing under the guidance of accomplished and published faculty mentors. Students can pursue internships to gain real-world writing and publishing experience by working on campus with The Beloit Poetry Journal, a distinguished poetry publication since 1950; or Alice James Books, an award-winning poetry-publishing house.
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Media Contact: Jeffrey Thomson, UMF professor of creative writing, at 207-778-7454, or jeffrey.thomson@maine.edu.
EDITOR’S NOTE:
Image: RP189-020A
Photo Caption: Mia Ayumi Malhotra
Photo Credit: Submitted Image
Image: RP189-020B
Photo Caption: Ellen Doré Watson
Photo Credit: Submitted Image
April Mulherin
UMF Associate Director for Media Relations
office: 207-778-7081
cell: 207-491-0064
april.mulherin@maine.edu