Description

Devon Walker-Figueroa, winner of the 2022 Levis Reading Prize for Philomath, reads from her poetry collection.

Philomath, Walker-Figueroa’s debut full-length poetry collection, was published by Milkweed Editions in 2021 and was selected by Sally Keith for the 2020 National Poetry Series. Philomath also was shortlisted for the National Book Critic Circle’s 2021 John Leonard Prize for Best First Book. Walker-Figueroa’s writing has also appeared in The Nation, POETRY, the American Poetry Review, Ploughshares, Zyzzyva, and elsewhere. She is a 2022-2023 Amy Lowell Traveling Scholar and the recipient of the New England Review’s 2018 Emerging Writer Award, the 2021 Poetry Society of America’s Lucille Medwick Award, and several notable scholarships. Walker-Figueroa received her education at Cornell University, Bennington College, the Iowa Writer’s Workshop and New York University, where she was the Jill Davis Fellow in fiction.

The event is free and open to all and will be held in person but will also be live streamed through Zoom. The in-person location will be James Branch Cabell Library, Room 303, 901 Park Ave., Richmond, Va. 23219. Parking is available for a fee in the West Broad Street, West Main Street and West Cary Street parking decks.

Please register to attend in person or online. For questions or accommodations, please contact the VCU Libraries Events Office at rbpander@vcu.edu or (804) 828-0593.

Register

Please register to attend. 

About the Author

Devon Walker-Figueroa is the author of Philomath, selected for the 2020 National Poetry Series by Sally Keith and shortlisted for the 2021 National Book Critic Circle’s John Leonard Prize. She grew up in Kings Valley, a ghost town in the Oregon Coast Range, and received her education from Cornell University; Bennington College; the Iowa Writers’ Workshop; and New York University, where she was the Jill Davis Fellow in fiction. A current Amy Lowell Travelling Scholar, her poems have appeared in The Nation, POETRY, the American Poetry Review, and elsewhere. 

Sponsors

The Levis Reading Prize is presented on behalf of VCU's M.F.A. in Creative Writing Program in partnership with VCU Libraries. Sponsors include the VCU Department of English, Barnes & Noble @ VCU and the VCU College of Humanities and Sciences, with additional funding provided by the family of Larry Levis.

Image: Photo courtesy of Devon Walker-Figueroa