Poet Laura Kasischke

2012 UNT Rilke Prize

for Space, in Chains

Laura Kasischke’s Space, in Chains, published by Copper Canyon Press, has won the first annual UNT Rilke Prize. The $10,000 prize recognizes a book written by a mid-career poet and published in the preceding year that demonstrates exceptional artistry and vision. In this collection that explores imaginative freedom in the face of personal loss, Kasischke reveals a penetrating insight into what makes people work and not work through her characteristic emotional range, wit, surprising and uncanny imagery, and an intensity created through spare and radiant language. We see ourselves as “space, in chains,” bound and free, challenged by the book’s transfigurations of anxiety and grief into tribute and play. Kasischke will read at University of North Texas on Thursday, April 19 and at The Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture on Friday, April 20.

Kasischke has published eight collections of poetry and eight novels. She has been the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and two grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, among other awards. Two of her novels have been made into feature length films, and her poetry has been published in Poetry, American Poetry Review, The New Republic, and elsewhere. Kasischke teaches at the University of Michigan, and lives in Chelsea, Michigan, with her husband and son.

Schedule of Events

Thursday, April 19, 2012: UNT Reading, Eagle Student Services Center, Room 255, 8pm Q & A, 4-5pm, Language Building, Room 316 Friday, April 20, 2012: The Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture, 6:30pm Reception, Reading at 7:30pm

Kasischke’s other awards include the Alice Fay Di Castagnola Award from the Poetry Society of America, the Elmer Bobst Award for Emerging Writers, the Juniper Prize, the Beatrice Hawley Award from Alice James Books, and several Pushcart Prizes. Space, in Chains was listed as one of the New York Times’ 100 Notable Books of 2011 and won the National Book Critic Circle Award for Poetry. Her other collections of poetry include Lilies, Without, Gardening in the Dark, Wild Brides, Housekeeping in a Dream, Fire and Flower and What It Wasn't. Her novels include The Raising, Suspicious River, White Bird in a Blizzard, and The Life Before Her Eyes, which is the basis for the film of the same name.

The judges also selected three finalists for this year’s Rilke Prize: Kevin Prufer’s In a Beautiful Country (Four Way Books), Dana Levin’s Sky Burial (Copper Canyon), and Wayne Miller’s The City, Our City (Milkweed Editions).

For information about the Rilke Prize or these events, please contact Lisa Vining at [email protected]

Links for More Information Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture UNT Department of English University of Michigan National Book Critics Circle Award 2011 The Poetry Foundation NPR Books KERA Art & Seek Laura Kasischke The New York Times 100 Notable Books of 2011