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            Auburn University - University Relations
                         (334) 844-9999
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4/12/95                 Janet McCoy

PULITZER PRIZE POET KIZER TO GIVE AU'S BENSON LECTURE APRIL 18

      AUBURN -- Pulitzer Prize winning poet Carolyn Kizer will give the 
1995 Carl Benson Lecture in 20th century literature on Tuesday, April 18, 
on the Auburn University campus.
      Kizer's 4 p.m. lecture in the AU Hotel and Conference Center 
auditorium is titled "Great Women Poets."  It is taken from her work 
editing One Hundred Great Women Poets, an anthology to be published in 
May 1995 by Ecco Press.  A reception will follow Kizer's lecture.
      In addition, Kizer will give a public reading of her poetry at 8 
p.m. Monday, April 17, in the AU Chapel. Both events are free and open to 
the public.
      The lecture series is named for the late Carl Benson, Hargis 
Professor of English and a prominent member of the AU faculty from 
1947-74. Kizer's lecture is sponsored by the AU Department of English and 
the university's Special Lectures Program.  Her reading is sponsored by 
the Women's Studies Program, the Department of English and the 
university's Special Lectures Program.
      Kizer, a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, is the 
author of a collection of essays on poetry, Proses, and of several books 
of poetry, including Mermaids in the Basement  and The Nearness of You.
      Founder of the poetry quarterly Poetry Northwest, Kizer has been 
poet-in-residence at many major U.S. universities, and holds the Coal 
Chair in Creative Writing at the University of Alabama.
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      CONTACT: Constance Relihan, Department of English, 334/844-9028.