2009 ANNUAL WALT WHITMAN
BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION
MAY 9, 2009
*Walt’s actual birthday is May 31st
11:30 AM: LUNCH WITH ED FOLSOM, at the Lone Star College-Montgomery Library, Dr. Folsom, Director of the Walt Whitman Archives and scores of books on Whitman, is the foremost font of information on the life and works of Walt Whitman. There will be a performance by Prof. Marion Russell Dickson ( St. Thomas University Artist in Residence) of several of Walt Whitman’s favorite opera pieces. She is performed in NYC’s Carnegie Hall March 14th. (Box lunch reservations ($10.00) email by May 7.
1:30 PM: PANEL OF WALT WHITMAN SCHOLARS, including Ed Folsom (, Michael Robertson (Worshiping Walt, Princeton University Press), Jimmie Killingsworth (Whitman’s Poetry of the Body, University of N.C. Press), Jerome Loving (Walt Whitman: The Song of Himself (University of California Press), Whitman In Country), and award winning poet & scholar Paul Christensen.
3:30 PM: ANNUAL GATHERING OF POETS @Conroe Symphony Centre Building (on the square/formally the Texas Arts Venue) on the square in Conroe, a party and cake cutting with twenty published poets, panel members, creative writing professors, MCLAC board members, and community will read their favorite Whitman poem. The twenty distinguished poets, poetry community leaders and creative writing teachers will also read one of their own works and have their books for sale and autograph.
Contact: Dave Parsons dmparsons@consolidated.net or
Cliff Hudder clifford.w.hudder@lonestar.edu