March 29, 2018

Writers series concluding with poet, nonfiction writer Peter Conners

Northwest Missouri State University’s Department of Language, Literature and Writing will conclude its 2017-18 Visiting Writers Series with Peter Conners, a publisher and writer of nonfiction and poetry, on Thursday, April 12.

The reading, which is free and open to the public, begins at 7:30 p.m. in the Tower View Room at the J.W. Jones Student Union.

Conners is an author of nine books of nonfiction, fiction and poetry, and he has edited dozens of volumes of poetry and prose. His nonfiction books – “Cornell ‘77,” “Growing Up Dead,” “JAMerica,” and “White Hand Society” — have garnered him a reputation as a leading chronicler of the Grateful Dead, jam band and countercultural community. In 2017, “Cornell ’77: The Music, Myth and Magnificence of the Grateful Dead’s Concert at Barton Hall,” was included in the Grammy-nominated Grateful Dead box set, “May 1977: Get Shown the Light.”

Conners regularly gives readings and lectures at universities, conferences, bookstores, art galleries and on panels related to music, counterculture, poetry, fiction and editing. His books have received reviews in such places as Rolling Stone magazine, Library Journal, Penthouse, Publishers Weekly, Vice, Kirkus, The Onion and the New York Post. The San Francisco Chronicle noted that “Conners writes like a poet and researches like a scholar,” and NPR Books likened his writing to “the way music sounds when your surrender has no limit.”

His other books include the prose poetry collections “Of Whiskey and Winter” and “The Crows Were Laughing in their Trees” as well as the novella “Emily Ate the Wind.” He is also editor of PP/FF: An Anthology.

Conners lives with his wife and children in Rochester, New York. He is publisher of the award-winning independent publishing house BOA Editions, Ltd.

The Visiting Writers Series is designed to promote creativity, diversity, and freedom of expression as a living and meaningful art form that provides its audience with a better understanding of people and the world.   

Kawasaki Motors Manufacturing Corporation, Green Tower Press, and the Department of Language, Literature and Writing are sponsors of the series.

For more information, contact Daniel Biegelson, director of the Visiting Writers Series and an instructor of English, at dbiegel@nwmissouri.edu or 660.562.1266.