Creative Writing events in April feature industry professionals

Colophon, conversations on publishing, is featuring events on April 17 and 19, free and open to the public. The series, part of the Creative Writing Program, places editors, agents, writers, and other publishing insiders, in conversation about literary careers.

April 17: Editor and agent discuss publishing industry
Legendary editor Sarah Crichton, and agent Jessica Regel, who represents multiple bestsellers, will be in conversation with Creative Writing Program director Timothy Schaffert, about the publishing industry.

For 15 years, Crichton was the publisher of Sarah Crichton Books, an imprint of FSG, where she published such award-winning books as "A Long Way Gone: Memoir of a Boy Soldier" by Ishmael Beah and "The Silver Linings Playbook" by Matthew Quick. During her time as publisher of Little, Brown, Crichton published Malcolm Gladwell's "The Tipping Point," David Foster Wallace's "Infinite Jest," several books by David Sedaris, and acquired "Lovely Bones" by Alice Sebold.

Regel is the founder of Helm Literary. After growing up in Iowa, Regel entered the book industry and became familiar with all components of an author's contract, including foreign, film, and audio rights. She agented Emily Danforth's UNL dissertation, "The Miseducation of Cameron Post." Among her other credits: the bestsellers "Beautiful Little Fools" by Jillian Cantor, "Bad Vibes Only" by Nora McInerny, "All the Ugly and Wonderful Things" by Bryn Greenwood, and many others.

April 19: Literary Editing and Publishing Poetry
Drawing from their work as editors, the two poets will reflect on the role of literature in the advancement of intellectual and cultural modernity in Africa and the United States.

A poet, translator, and essayist, Daniel Simon is assistant director and editor in chief of World Literature Today magazine at the University of Oklahoma, where he also serves on the English, International Studies, and Judaic Studies faculty. The author of two previous verse collections, "Cast Off" (2015) and "After Reading Everything" (2016), his third book of poems, "Under a Gathering Sky," is new from Stephen F. Austin State University Press.

Chibueze Darlington Anuonye, a P.hD student in the English Department, is the curator of "Selfies and Signatures: An Afro Anthology of Short Stories," co-editor of "Daybreak: An Anthology of Nigerian Short Fiction" and editor of "Through the Eye of a Needle: Art in the Time of Coronavirus." Anuonye was longlisted for the 2018 Babishai Niwe African Poetry Award. "Unbound," his co-edited anthology of contemporary Nigerian poetry (with Nduka Otiono), is forthcoming.