Keynote Speaker

Join us for a keynote address by Kansas author and poet Huascar Medina.  He is the 2019-2022 Poet Laureate of Kansas and currently resides in Lawrence.  As a Latino living in Kansas, Medina has experienced firsthand the “otherness” spoken of by Esperanza in Sandra Cisneros’ The House on Mango Street.  His poems capture the sense of place, the search for identity, and the need for belonging that we read about in this year’s NEA Big Read selection.