Natalie Díaz will be (virtually) coming to Rutgers for a live Zoom session on Wednesday July 14th! Díaz won an American Book Award for her first collection of poems, When My Brother Was an Aztec, in 2012, and recently won the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for her second collection (Postcolonial Love Poem) released last year. She was awarded a MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant in 2018 and is the youngest person ever to become a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. A Mojave born and raised in the Fort Mojave Indian Village and an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian Tribe, Díaz is known for addressing issues facing Native communities in her poetry, such as racism, poverty, addiction, and especially the conservation of languages and cultures.
I’ll be interviewing Díaz about her poem “My Brother at 3 A.M.,” selected as one of our Summer Tales readings, and about her poetry more generally. I’m particularly interested in talking about her language conservation work, the images (like fruit, or hips, or wounds) that recur throughout her body of work, and how her past as a professional basketball player influences her poetry.
What would you like to ask? Let us know in the comments!