Ben Belitt Colloquium on Reginald Shepherd ‘88

OPEN TO THE PUBLIC | Please join us for the 2024 Ben Belitt Colloquium on Arts and Literary Culture at Bennington, a special evening devoted to the life and work of poet Reginald Shepherd ‘88 (1963–2008), an under-celebrated member of Bennington's literary pantheon. We will explore Shepherd’s place in contemporary poetry, the question of who belongs in the literary canon and why, the legacy of AIDS and public silence, and what Queer writers owe (or do not owe) to their communities. Shepherd’s work is known for its elegance, beauty, and critical acumen.

The 2024 Ben Belitt Colloquium will bring three nationally celebrated writers together campus to discuss Shepherd’s life and work: Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Jericho Brown, author most recently of The Tradition (Copper Canyon, 2019) and editor of the new collection The Selected Shepherd (U Pitt Press, 2024); MacArthur Fellowship winning novelist and essayist Jonathan Lethem '86, whose most recent book is Brooklyn Crime Novel (Ecco Press, 2024); and poet Camille Rankine, author of the poetry collection Incorrect Merciful Impulses (Copper Canyon, 2016) and recipient of the Discover Poetry Prize.

This event is open to the public and will be livestreamed. Register here.

Bios

Reginald Shepherd '88 was born in New York City and grew up in the Bronx. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Bennington College and studied at Brown University and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. His first collection, Some Are Drowning (1994), won the Associated Writing Program’s Award in Poetry; his fourth, Otherhood (2003), was a finalist for the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize; and his last book, Fata Morgana (2007), won a Silver Medal in the Florida Book Awards. Shepherd’s work is known for its elegance, beauty, and critical acumen. As Ron Silliman wrote in a tribute to Shepherd, who died in 2008 in Pensacola, FL, “Shepherd took from all schools and created something entirely his own.” Shepherd was the author of a book of essays, Orpheus in the Bronx: Essays on Identity, Politics, and the Freedom of Poetry (2008), and the editor of two anthologies, The Iowa Anthology of New American Poetries (2004) and Lyric Postmodernisms (2008). He was also an active blogger who helped to shape an emerging forum for poetics.

Jericho Brown is author of The Tradition (Copper Canyon 2019), for which he won the Pulitzer Prize. He is the recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard, and the National Endowment for the Arts, and he is the winner of the Whiting Award. Brown’s first book, Please (New Issues 2008), won the American Book Award. His second book, The New Testament (Copper Canyon 2014), won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award. His poems have appeared in The Bennington Review, Buzzfeed, Fence, jubilat, The New Republic, New York Times, The New Yorker, The Paris Review, TIME, and several volumes of The Best American Poetry. He is the director of the Creative Writing Program and a professor at Emory University.

Jonathan Lethem’s ('86) works include nine novels, five short-story collections, six non-fiction books, and an array of essays published in such publications as Rolling Stone, Harper’s, and The New Yorker. His novel Motherless Brooklyn was named Novel of the Year by Esquire magazine and won the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Salon Book Award as well as the Macallan Crime Writers Association Gold Dagger. He received a MacArthur Fellowship in 2005. He is currently the Roy Edward Disney '51 Professor of Creative Writing and Professor of English at Pomona College.

Camille Rankine earned a bachelor’s at Harvard University and an MFA at Columbia University. She is the author of the poetry collection Incorrect Merciful Impulses (Copper Canyon, 2015) and the chapbook Slow Dance with Trip Wire (2011), which was chosen by poet Cornelius Eady for the Poetry Society of America’s New York Chapbook Fellowship. Rankine’s honors include a “Discovery”/Boston Review Poetry Prize, a MacDowell Colony Fellowship, and an honorary Cave Canem Fellowship. She has served on the staff of the Cave Canem Foundation. She is an assistant professor at Carnegie Mellon University, serves as editorial director for the online literary journal The Manhattanville Review, and sings with the band Miru Mir.