Events › Poetry Fest Keynote: Marcelo Hernandez Castillo

Please join us for a conversation with our keynote speaker for Chicago Public Library's 26th Annual Poetry Fest Marcelo Hernandez Castillo. 

Marcelo Hernandez Castillo is the author of Children of the Land (Harper Collins); Cenzontle (BOA Editions), winner of the A. Poulin, Jr. prize; Dulce (Northwestern University Press), winner of the Drinking Gourd Prize; and, most recently, he is the co-editor of the anthology Here to Stay: Poetry and Prose from the Undocumented Diaspora (Harper Perennial). He is the 2025 guest editor of the Michigan Quarterly Review and has also curated the Academy of American Poet’s Poem-A-Day Series. His work has been long listed for the California Book Award, the Foreword Indies Prize, and the Lambda Literary Award, among other recognitions. He was the first undocumented student to graduate from the Helen Zell Writers Program at the University of Michigan and co-founded the Undocupoets, which eliminated citizenship requirements from all major poetry book prizes in the U.S., and for which he was recognized with the Barnes and Noble Writers for Writers award. He served as distinguished fellow for the Marshall Project’s Art For Justice initiative from the University of Arizona which advocates for prison reform and is an inaugural recipient of the Writing Freedom Fellowship from Haymarket Books and the Mellon Foundation. He currently serves as faculty in the MFA program at St. Mary’s College of California and at Ashland University’s Low-Res MFA program.

He will be in conversation with Alejandra Oliva. 

Alejandra Oliva is an essayist, embroiderer and translator. Her book, Rivermouth, was published in 2023 and received a Whiting Nonfiction Grant. She was the Yale Whitney Humanities Center Franke Visiting Fellow in Spring 2022. She has writing in The New York Times, Christian Century, Commonweal, The Nation, and more.

How to Attend:

Doors to the Auditorium open at 1:30 p.m. and seating is first come, first served (350 capacity). Books are available for purchase and the author will autograph books at the conclusion of the program.

This event will also take place live on CPL's YouTube channel and CPL's Facebook page. You'll be able to ask questions during the event as well! Can't make it to the live stream? We'll archive the video on YouTube to watch later.

Accessibility

Need sign language interpretation or other accessibility assistance for this event? Please call (312) 747-8184 or email access@chipublib.org to request accommodations. Requests must be made at least 14 business days before the event.

Photo credit: Blue Flower Arts and Alejandra Oliva