Professor Kamran Javadizadeh Participates in Stonington Literary Festival Honoring Poet James Merrill

Professor Kamran Javadizadeh recently participated in the Stonington Literary Festival, a three-day event that took place from October 2-4 and celebrated the poet James Merrill and his work. Since Merrill's death in 1996, his former home in Stonington, Connecticut has played host to a writers-in-residence program, in which Professor Javadizeh participated in 2022.

For this year's festival, which marked the centennial of Merrill's birth in 1926, Professor Javadizadeh and other former writers-in-residence were invited back to participate in panels, readings, and other events such as musical performances and tours.

Professor Javadizadeh served as the moderator for the "Poetic Afterlives" panel featuring poets Ange Mlinko and Rosanna Warren in which the group discussed Merrill's legacy. In a follow-up email, Professor Javadizadeh told me about the scope of the conversation. "A hot topic for us was how Merrill’s reputation as an urbane, technically virtuosic, witty poet made him unusual as a model for younger poets," Professor Javadizadeh said. "There was a large and lively audience--I thought it was a great event."

The final event of the festival was a group reading by the former writers-in-residence of Merrill's book of poems, Water Street, the first book he wrote upon moving to Stonington. Professor Javadizadeh read the final poem in the collection, "A Tenancy." A recording of the entire reading was posted to youtube and is available here.

More information about the event and James Merrill's work is available at the Merill House website.

Professor Kamran Javadizadeh reads James Merrill's poem "A Tenancy."

- by Nikola Stojcic MA '28