Brevard College presents a poetry reading by Tucson-based poet and writer, Julie Swarstad Johnson on October 22nd at 6 p.m. The reading, sponsored by a grant through the Brevard College Pedagogies Committee, will take place in Brevard College’s McLarty-Goodson building, room 125. The event is free and open to the public.
Swarstad Johnson will read from her first full-length book of poetry Pennsylvania Furnace, published by Unicorn Press, 2019. Swarstad Johnson holds a Master of Fine Arts in poetry from Penn State University. She served as Artist in Residence at Gettysburg National Military Park and co-edited Beyond Earth’s Edge: The Poetry of Spaceflight, set for publication by the University of Arizona Press in 2020. She lives in Tucson, Arizona, where she works for the University of Arizona Poetry Center and writes book reviews for Havard Review Online and others.
Her first poetry chapbook, Jumping the Pit (Finishing Line Press, 2015) received excellent reviews.
“Before the Civil War, Pennsylvania was the world’s most prolific producer of iron and steel. With the careful intelligence of a skilled historian and the voice of a lyric poet, Julie Swarstad Johnson resurrects that era. Her concise, finely tuned poems offer intimate glimpses into the lives of women and men who worked and owned iron furnaces, and those who observed them. More broadly, Jumping the Pit spans a century to reveal the implications of industrial development in memorable terms that speak to the dilemmas of our times,” said Julia Spicher Kasdorf, author of Poetry in America.
Brevard College is consistently recognized as one of the best liberal arts colleges. The College’s focus on experiential learning, small class sizes, and location the mountains of Western North Carolina near Asheville makes Brevard a top choice college for students around the world.