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The UMass Amherst MFA for Poets and Writers will present UMass MFA’s Literary Arts Festival Friday, March 27, and Saturday, March 28.

Celebrating the literary community of Western Massachusetts and one of the oldest and most prestigious MFA programs in the country, the UMass MFA’s Literary Arts Festival is a two-day event held annually during the spring. The festival features readings from internationally known poets and prose writers, panel discussions, conversations with agents, editors, and publishers, and opportunities for students across the region as well as community members to engage in discussions with emerging and established literary artists. This year, the festival will include genre specific publishing panels designed for poets and prose writers.

The festival’s programming brings together alumni and current students of the UMass MFA as past, present and future contributors to American and international literary arts. The event, which started in 2004 as the Big/Small Press Fest before being known as the Juniper Literary Festival, is free and open to the public, and since 2018 has served as a centerpiece for the MFA’s Accepted Students Weekend, introducing a new group of emerging writers to the vibrant literary community in and around Amherst.

The UMass MFA’s Literary Arts Festival is produced by the University of Massachusetts Amherst MFA for Poets and Writers and the Juniper Initiative for Literary Arts and Action. The festival is supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, the UMass Provost’s Office, the UMass English Department, the UMass Arts Council and individual contributors.

More information about the festival, including the presenters’ bios, can be found on the festival’s site.

For questions contact Ryan Mihaly of the Department of English at [email protected].
 

UMass MFA’s Literary Arts Festival Schedule 

Friday, March 27
Old Chapel

3 p.m. - Literary Publishing Panel with Emily Stokes, Peter Gizzi, and Dan Bevacqua

6 p.m. - Reading with Jordy Rosenberg & Fred Moten with Brandon Lopez

8 p.m. - LiveLit Reading with Current MFA Students

Saturday, March 28
Old Chapel

3 p.m. - Editing and Publishing Panel (Poetry) with Suzanna Tamminen, Peter Gizzi, Abby Chabitnoy

3 p.m. - Editing and Publishing Panel (Prose) with Ben Brooks, Iwalani Kim, Gabriel Bump

6 p.m. - Alumni Reading with Sarah Ghazal Ali, Thérèse Soukar Chehade, Nathan Hill, and Daniel Moysaenko

7 p.m. - Reception