Posted on August 19, 2024
The MFA Writing Program at UNC Greensboro and The Greensboro Review will host a book release celebration for Ever After, Fred Chappell’s final collection of poetry, on Saturday, October 26th at 4PM at Scuppernong Books, 304 S. Elm Street. The event is free and open to the public.
In his final book, the celebrated poet Fred Chappell reflects on life and the beyond. Details drawn from daily actions, religion, classical myth, and the Appalachian landscape adorn this autumnal collection that unearths connections both strong and tenuous among apparently disparate subjects, all percolated with Chappell’s signature wit and warm vision. A student’s observation that “Poems are how we see with our eyes closed” comes to resemble an icon of sorrow. A stairway to heaven ends with a jug of wine. Memories assume shifting appearances. Often written in traditional sonnet forms, Chappell’s poems display astonishing technical skill and indefatigable humanity as they gaze on the challenges of life and the great unknown.
A spirited and friendly farewell, Ever After shows an accomplished and much-beloved American writer gracing us with poems of remarkable originality, craft, and insight.
Before his death in 2024, FRED CHAPPELL published more than thirty volumes of poetry and prose. Honors bestowed on his work include the Bollingen Prize, the Aiken Taylor Award, the T. S. Eliot Prize, and the Thomas Wolfe Prize. His fiction was translated into more than a dozen languages and received the Best Foreign Book Award from the Académie Française. A native of Canton in the mountains of western North Carolina, Chappell was the state’s poet laureate from 1997 to 2002 and an English professor at the University of North Carolina–Greensboro for forty years.
