Few poets possess the verve and brilliance of Diane Ackerman. Her first poetry collection, The Planets: A Cosmic Pastoral, combined scientific fact with imaginative fancy so gracefully that Carl Sagan called her work "stunning...spectacularly good poetry, clear, lyrical and soaring" and later enlisted her as a researcher in his Cosmos series. The Hudson Review said of her second book, Wife of Light, "Ackerman takes the American language to school and lets it graduate with her own unique mintage. Her poems reveal a woman of sensitivity, restraint, ingenuity, and passionate daring." Her third book of poems, Lady Faustus, released last month by Morrow, extends the range of her interests to learning how to fly, to dreaming and knowing how to dream, and to probing the worlds of possibility and curiosity. Strong, exuberant, and honest, Ackerman has been called by Review, "arguably, the best lyrical poet now writing in the United States."

Ackerman has also published a prose memoir, Twilight of the Tenderfoot. She will read her poetry on Wednesday afternoon. [extracted from 1983 brochure]

6th Annual Literary Festival

15th Annual Literary Arts Festival