Lakeland University’s Esch Library will host a poetry reading of Professor Karl Elder’s “Phobophobia” on Tuesday, Oct. 29, at 7:30 p.m. The event is free and open to all.
“Phobophobia” was originally published in 1987 in collaboration with Prickly Pear Press as a special issue of his magazine, “Seems,” and was recently re-released by the global publishing house Cyberwit of India. “Photophobia” is available online at Amazon.com.
Elder will read aloud for about 30 minutes and then answer any questions.
“For years I have bemoaned the fact that ‘Phobophobia,’ considered by some readers the most inventive of my 10 collections of poems, has been out of print,” said Elder, LU’s Fessler Professor of Creative Writing and Poet in Residence.
“Then, early this summer, from halfway around the world – as if in words too good to be true – arrived an invitation to submit a manuscript. With current projects incomplete, I suggested the publisher take a look at the 1987 book, and – voilà! – here it is in print again.”
A member of Lakeland’s faculty since 1979, Elder has 10 published books, more than 22 anthologies and approximately 500 published poems in various magazines. He has won more than a dozen awards, including most recently the Christopher Latham Scholes Award from the Council of Wisconsin Writers.