Overview
The Anthony Hecht Poetry Prize Reading with Eavan Boland and Austin Allen
Co-sponsored with The Waywiser Press
Introduced by Phillip Hoy, editor-in-chief of The Waywiser Press
The Hecht Poetry Prize, created in honor of the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Anthony Hecht, is awarded annually by The Waywiser Press for a poetry collection by a poet who has published no more than one previous book of verse. It includes publication with a $3,000 prize.
Eavan Boland’s eloquent verse often references her native Ireland, painting its history with a haunting lyricism. She has published ten volumes of poetry, most recently New Collected Poems and A Woman Without Country and prose including Object Lessons: The Life of the Woman and the Poet in Our Time. Her honors include the Lannan Award for Poetry and an American Ireland Fund Literary Award.
Austin Allen’s poetry has appeared in The Yale Review, 32 Poems, Southwest Review, The Missouri Review, Prelude, among others. Pleasures of the Game is his first book and winner of the 2016 Anthony Hecht Poetry Prize. He is currently a Lecturer in the Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University.