02 Oct 2023 Carolyn Forché visits UCA as an artist-in-residence

CONWAY — The University of Central Arkansas will host Carolyn Forché as an artist-in-residence from Tuesday, Oct. 3 to Wednesday, Oct. 4. 

Forché is an American poet, editor, professor and translator. She is known around the globe for her human rights advocacy, where she works to preserve the memory and culture of communities that have been laid siege to. 

Forché will host a public reading of her memoir, “What You Have Heard Is True,” on Tuesday, Oct. 3 at 7:30 p.m. in the Windgate Center for Fine and Performing Arts Concert Hall. The public reading will be followed by a book signing.

“What You Have Heard is True” is a visionary work in which Forche describes her own experience as a young woman and the difficult decision she made to battle the terrors that plagued her local communities. “What You Have Heard is True” was published by Penguin Random House and was nominated for the 2019 National Book Awards.

The public reading will also include Forché’s famed collection of poems, “Against Forgetting.” These poems were praised by Nelson Mandela as a “blow against tyranny, against prejudice, against injustice.” Following the conclusion of “Against Forgetting,” Forché will read a portion of the 2014 anthology “The Poetry of Witness.”

Additionally, Forché will hold an interview with the editors of SLANT on Tuesday, Oct. 3 at 4 p.m. in Thompson Hall, room 331. SLANT is a publication of UCA’s Department of English which features contemporary poetry.

Support for this residency is sponsored by the School of Language and Literature in conjunction with the Creative Writing program, with additional support provided by Pyramid Art, Books and Custom Framing.

Events are free and open to the public.