NEWS

Award-winning Shreveport poet to read at Louisiana Tech

Apr 19, 2016 | Liberal Arts

In celebration of Poetry Month, award-winning Shreveport poet Katie Bickham will speak about and read her poetry at Louisiana Tech University on Thursday, April 28.  The reading and a book signing to follow are free to the public and scheduled for 6-7 p.m. in George T. Madison Hall Auditorium, Room 105.
Katie Bickham

Katie Bickham


Before the reading, Bickham will give an informal talk and respond to questions at 4:30 p.m. with Sigma Tau Delta English honor society, the Poetry Society and English majors in GTM, Room 223. Students and faculty interested in creative writing may also attend.
Bickham earned her B.A. in literature and M.A. in liberal arts from Louisiana State University-Shreveport. Then, to advance her talent as a writer, she entered and graduated from the Stonecoast MFA program at the University of Southern Maine. Bickham’s poems have appeared in “Southern Quarterly,” “Prairie Schooner,” “Pleiades,” “The Missouri Review,” “Deep South Magazine” and elsewhere.
Her work has won “The Missouri Review” Editor’s Prize, and her first book, “The Belle Mar,” published by LSU Press, was selected by Alicia Ostriker as the winner of The Lena-Miles Wever Todd Poetry Prize. This collection examines the history of a house that was built during the years of slavery; in actuality, the house is a composite of several south Louisiana plantation houses, which Bickham researched.
In an interview with Pleiades Press, she expresses her hopes for her book: “But what if we took a break from trying to apologize for or repair our history and just remembered it? Just sat in that deep discomfort and felt our place in it? What if we don’t get to have catharsis? What if we don’t get to decide when, if ever, the ugliness is resolved? I think this is the better way to learn.”
Bickham teaches at Bossier Parish Community College in Bossier City.  She lives in Shreveport with her husband, son and their oddly-shaped shelter dogs in a very old house.
The readings are sponsored by the Louisiana Tech University English Department.
Written by Judith Roberts – jroberts@latech.edu