A House Called Tomorrow: Copper Canyon at 50

Join us for a conversation continuing the Poetry Foundation’s celebration of Copper Canyon Press’s 50th anniversary. Executive editor Michael Wiegers will moderate a discussion of Copper Canyon’s legacy and future in the poetry world with panelists Arthur Sze, Chris Abani, Tishani Doshi, and Alison C. Rollins. 

This is a hybrid event, which will be offered in-person and via livestream. Copies of A House Called Tomorrow, Copper Canyon’s special 50th anniversary anthology, will be available for sale. 

Chris Abani is a novelist, poet, essayist, screenwriter and playwright. Born in Nigeria to an Igbo father and English mother, he grew up in Afikpo, Nigeria, received a BA in English from Imo State University, Nigeria, an MA in English, Gender and Culture from Birkbeck College, University of London and a PhD in Literature and Creative Writing from the University of Southern California. He has resided in the United States since 2001.

Tishani Doshi publishes poetry, essays and fiction. Recent books include the poetry collection Girls Are Coming Out of the Woods, shortlisted for the Ted Hughes Award, and a novel, Small Days and Nights, shortlisted for the RSL Ondaatje Prize and a New York Times Bestsellers Editor’s Choice. For fifteen years Tishani worked as a dancer with the Chandralekha group in Madras, India. A God at the Door, her fourth full-length collection, is published by Copper Canyon Press, and was shortlisted for the 2021 Forward Poetry Prize.

Alison C. Rollins was named a National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellow in 2019. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in American Poetry Review, Iowa Review, The New York Times Magazine, and elsewhere. A Cave Canem and Callaloo fellow, she was a 2016 recipient of the Poetry Foundation’s Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship. In 2018, she was a recipient of the Rona Jaffe Writers' Award and in 2020, the winner of a Pushcart Prize. Her debut poetry collection, Library of Small Catastrophes was a 2020 Hurston/Wright Foundation Legacy Award nominee.

Arthur Sze has published eleven books of poetry, including The Glass Constellation: New and Collected Poems; Sight Lines, which won the 2019 National Book Award for Poetry; and Compass Rose, a Pulitzer Prize finalist. Sze is the recipient of many honors, including a 2022 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize for Lifetime Achievement from the Poetry Foundation, a Shelley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America, the Jackson Poetry Prize from Poets & Writers, a Lannan Literary Award, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. He is a professor emeritus at the Institute of American Indian Arts.

Michael Wiegers has been editing poetry at Copper Canyon Press for 30 years, advocating for poets at every stage of their writing lives. He is the editor of A House Called Tomorrow as well as What About This: Collected Poems of Frank Stanford.

In-Person Attendance

All guests over the age of two must wear a mask inside the Poetry Foundation building. If you are unwilling to comply with this requirement, you will not be granted entry to the event. Please note that some performers may choose to perform without a mask. Guests are encouraged to register in advance.

Livestream Attendance
The livestream link will be shared with registered guests on the day of the event. In order to receive the livestream details, please register in advance here.

Poetry Foundation’s events are completely free of charge and open to the public. This event will include CART captioning and ASL interpretation. For more information about accessibility at the Poetry Foundation, please visit our Accessibility Guide.