Evie Shockley, Poet, with Xavier Clark, Playwright

Harold Clurman Poetry Reading Series presents
Evie Shockley, Poet, with Xavier Clark, Playwright
Discussion and Reading
Thursday, February 13, 2025 at 7pm
Free and Open to the Public

Poet & literary scholar Evie Shockley thinks, creates, and writes with her eye on a Black feminist horizon. Her books of poetry include suddenly we (NAACP Image Award; National Book Award Finalist), semiautomatic (Hurston/Wright Legacy Award; Pulitzer Prize finalist), and the new black (Hurston/Wright Legacy Award). She publishes widely and has been translated into French, Polish, Slovenian, and Spanish.  Among the honors for her body of work are the Shelley Memorial Award, the Lannan Literary Award for Poetry, the Holmes National Poetry Prize, and the Stephen Henderson Award. Her joys include participating in poetry communities such as Cave Canem and collaborating with artists working in various media.  Shockley is the Zora Neale Hurston Distinguished Professor of English at Rutgers University.

Xavier Clark is a multidisciplinary theatre artist from Turkey with West African roots. His plays include ICONS (dev.: IAMA Theatre Emerging Playwrights Lab, 2024 O’Neill NPC Finalist), backstroke boys (dev.: Fault Line Theatre, 2021 Blue Ink Award Finalist), supper (dev.: National Black Theatre, 2022 O’Neill NPC Finalist), retrofit(s) (dev.: UC San Diego, 2019 Lark Playwrights Week Finalist), and Where Angels Fear to Tread (dev.: Echo Theatre Company). He is a recipient of a 2024 Walter E. Dakin Fellowship to the Sewanee Writers Conference, an Artistic Associate with Fault Line Theatre, and an alum of various programs, such as IAMA Theatre’s 2022-23 Emerging Playwrights Lab, The Strides Collective’s 2023 Emerging Playwrights Program and The Gatekeeper’s Collective’s inaugural “learning to love” playwriting fellowship, led by Donja R. Love. BFA in Drama: NYU Tisch, MFA in Acting: UC San Diego, Adjunct Faculty: Stella Adler Studio & Montclair State University