FARMINGTON — The University of Maine at Farmington’s celebrated Visiting Writers Series presents award-winning poet Gibson Fay-LeBlanc as the popular program’s fourth reader of the 2021/2022 season. Fay-LeBlanc will read from his work at 7:30 p.m., Thursday, Feb. 10, 2022, in The Landing in the UMF Olsen Student Center.
The reading is free and open to the public and will be followed by a book signing with the author. Reservations are required and guests must adhere to the University’s Covid safe practices, including wearing a mask at all times while inside campus buildings and social distancing when possible. Reservations can be made at: https://forms.gle/kY7iD77ZfGQjsGF68
Fay-LeBlanc’s “Deke Dangle Dive” (CavanKerry Press, 2021) explores illness, fatherhood and masculinity through ice hockey and the natural world and considers how poems speak to us and through us when all seems lost. His poetry and prose have also been featured in the Kenyon Review, The New Republic, and Tin House, among others. His first poetry collection “Death of a Ventriloquist” won the Vassar Miller Prize.
Fay-LeBlanc is the executive director of the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance. He earned graduate degrees from UC Berkeley and Columbia University.
“Deke Dangle Dive” is available for pre-purchase at the UMF University Store and Devaney, Doak and Garret Booksellers.
The Visiting Writer Series is sponsored by the UMF Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Program.
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 Sandy River Review, a student-run literary magazine; Ripple Zine, a feminist magazine; The Farmington Flyer, a university newspaper; or Alice James Books, an award-winning poetry publishing house.
