The Kentucky Arts Council will host a celebration to mark Kentucky Writers’ Day April 24 beginning at 6 p.m. at the Spalding University library, 853 Library Lane near downtown Louisville.
The event is the highlight of a week-long celebration planned across the state to “recognize the Commonwealth’s literary tradition,” said a press release from the arts council.
The celebration will include poetry readings by Frederick Smock, Kentucky’s current poet laureate, and Maureen Morehead and Joe Survant, both former Kentucky poet laureates. The event will also feature a panel discussion about Kentucky’s literary tradition.
“On Kentucky Writers’ Day, turn off the phone. Log off the computer. Do not turn on the television. For a few minutes, just read a poem. Let it sink in,” Smock said in the release. “Follow where your mind goes with it, for you are the only authority on what the poem means to you.”
The Kentucky General Assembly established Kentucky’s Writers’ Day in 1990 to “honor Kentucky’s strong literary tradition” and to commemorate the anniversary of the birth of Kentucky native Robert Penn Warren, the first poet laureate of the U.S. and winner of three Pulitzer prizes, said the press release.
