Shara McCallum, 2021-22 Penn State Laureate and Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of English, will discuss her creative process and read from her works on Tuesday, March 29 at 7 PM at Penn State Great Valley.

According to McCallum, her latest book, No Ruined Stone, is a “novel in verse” based on a thread from the life of Robert Burns. The Scottish poet was considering migrating to Jamaica to work on a slave plantation around the same time his first book was being published in 1786.

Her poems have been translated into several languages.

She has won the Silver Musgrave Medal, the OCM Bocas Poetry Prize, a Witter Bynner Fellowship from the Library of Congress, an NEA Fellowship in Poetry, the Oran Robert Perry Burke Award for Nonfiction, and the Agnes Lynch Starrett Prize.

Copies of McCallum’s book will be available at the event for purchase and signing. Originally from Jamaica, McCallum is a poet who has authored six books and has had poems and essays published in journals, anthologies, and textbooks throughout the United States, the Caribbean, Latin America, Europe, and Israel.

The event will be held in Penn State Great Valley’s Conference Center Building. The event is free to attend, but advance registration is required.