April 7: Final 2021-22 Good Thunder Reading Series Event Features Poets' Virtual Visit

Thursday, April 7, 2022
10:00 AM - 11:00 AM
Virtual workshop to open event

Mankato, Minn. – Minnesota State University, Mankato’s fourth and final 2021-22 event in the University’s annual Good Thunder Reading Series will feature virtual visits from poets Ross Gay and Anthony Procopio Ross on Thursday, April 7.

All Good Thunder Reading Series events are free and open to the public, and the April 7 event will be held virtually at https://minnstate.zoom.us/j/91232987640 (meeting ID: 912 3298 7640; password: Thunder).

Gay, the Nadine B. Andreas residency writer of 2022,  will open the April 7 virtual activities with a workshop from 10-11 a.m. and will be followed by a “Talk on Craft” from 3-4 p.m.

Procopio Ross, this year’s Andreas scholar, will read from his work from 7:30-8:30 p.m.

The Good Thunder Reading Series website provided the following short biographies on the two speakers:

Gay is the author of four books of poetry: “Be Holding,” a book-length poem about basketball great Julius Erving, and winner of the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award; “Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude,” winner of the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award and the 2016 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award; “Bringing the Shovel Down”; and “Against Which.”  His collection of essays, “The Book of Delights,” was released by Algonquin Books in 2019.  His many awards include a Guggenheim Fellowship. He is a founding board member of the Bloomington Community Orchard, a non-profit, free fruit-for-all food justice and joy project, and he teaches at Indiana University.

Procopio Ross is a poetry MFA candidate at Minnesota State Mankato. Procopio Ross spends his time writing, interviewing artists and creating hand-cut collages for himself and to support the literary arts, making flyers and covers. His poems have appeared in the Laurel Review, forthcoming in Bear Review, Thrice Publishing’s 2018 Surrealist Anthology, Levee Magazine, Evocations Review and Warm Milk Magazine among others.

Founded in 1981, the Good Thunder Reading Series brings nationally and internationally acclaimed writers from diverse backgrounds and literary traditions to Mankato, Minnesota, with the goal of promoting access to great literature, inspiring creativity and connection in our communities, and fostering lively conversations about how writers work and why writing matters.

The Good Thunder Reading Series is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund.

The 2021-22 Good Thunder Reading Series also receives support from Minnesota State Mankato’s Department of English, College of Arts and Humanities, Division of Diversity and Inclusion, the Women’s Center, the Nadine B. Andreas Endowment, the Eddice B. Barber Visiting Writer Endowment, the Robert C. Wright Endowment and individual donors. Barnes & Noble Bookstore at Minnesota State Mankato provides additional assistance.

For more information or to get involved, contact Chris McCormick at 507-389-5500 or visit gt.mnsu.edu.

Minnesota State Mankato, a comprehensive university with 14,546 students, is part of the Minnesota State system, which includes 30 colleges and seven universities.

Contact

Chris McCormick
chris.mccormick@mnsu.edu