Hanif Abdurraqib Reading

This event has reached capacity. There is no waiting list. If you are currently enrolled in an English class, you may email [email protected]. 

The Walter Nathan Literary Initiatives presents Hanif Abdurraqib. Abdurraqib is a poet, essayist, and cultural critic from Columbus, Ohio, and the recipient of a MacArthur Foundation “Genius” grant. His most recent book, There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension, won the 2025 National Book Critics Circle Award and was longlisted for the National Book Award.

Presented by the Creative Writing Program and the Department of English, this in-person event is free and open to the public with registration. Register for Hanif Abdurraqib. For questions about accessibility services and the venue, please email [email protected] or call 612-626-1528.

Abdurraqib's 2021 book A Little Devil in America was the winner of the Carnegie Medal and the Gordon Burns Prize and a finalist for the National Book Award. His first collection of essays, They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us, was named one of the books of the year by NPR, Esquire, BuzzFeed, O: The Oprah Magazine, Pitchfork, and the Chicago Tribune, among others. Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to A Tribe Called Quest was a New York Times bestseller and a National Book Critics Circle Award and Kirkus Prize finalist and was longlisted for the National Book Award. His second collection of poems, A Fortune For Your Disaster, won the 2020 Lenore Marshall Prize. His debut full-length poetry collection, The Crown Ain't Worth Much, was named a finalist for the Eric Hoffer Book Prize and nominated for a Hurston-Wright Legacy Award. His poetry has been published in Muzzle, Vinyl, PEN American, and various other journals. His essays and music criticism have been published in the FADER, Pitchfork, the New Yorker, and the New York Times. Abdurraqib is a graduate of Beechcroft High School.