An afternoon designed to delight and inspire
- Free signed copy of Jabberwalking to the first 200 families
- Free writing journals for kids
- Interactive wordplay activity led by Jasminne Mendez of Tintero Projects
- Free poems upon request by the Inprint Poetry Buskers
- Reading by Houston Youth Poet Laureate Rukmini Kalamangalam, in partnership with Writers in the Schools
- Presentation and Q&A with U.S. Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera about his new book Jabberwalking at 3 pm
- POPston popsicles for sale
- Book sale, signing, and meet the author
- Free admission and all ages welcome
- Bus scholarships available for student groups, contact info@inprinthouston.org
For a flier about the event click here, for the facebook event click here.
Inprint invites you to enjoy an afternoon adventure of words and play at the Inprint Cool Brains! Spring Break Fest, featuring U.S. Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera. The fun filled afternoon will kick off at 2 pm with an interactive word play activity for kids of all ages led by writer/educator/Tintero Projects cofounder Jasminne Mendez, free poems on demand from the Inprint Poetry Buskers, free writing journals for kids, POPston popsicles for sale, and more. At 3 pm, Juan Felipe Herrera will make a presentation about his new book Jabberwalking. The first 200 families will receive a free signed copy of the book. A book signing* will follow so fans can meet the author. Blue Willow Bookshop will have additional books for sale. Join us for a joyful afternoon with one of our great poets and champions of poetry, in a program designed to delight and inspire.
Juan Felipe Herrera – author of more than 30 books, including collections of poetry, short stories, prose, young adult novels, and picture books for children – was in 2015 appointed the 21st Poet Laureate of the United States, the first Mexican American to hold the post. During his laureateship (2015-2017), Herrera traveled widely, making approximately 130 official appearances, and became known for his energy, enthusiasm, and desire to include everyday citizens in the celebratory work of creating literature. The son of migrant farmworkers, educated at UCLA, Stanford, and the Iowa Writers Workshop, Herrera credits his mother and teachers with encouraging him to write poetry.
He comes to Houston to share his new one-of-a-kind book for middle-graders on writing poetry, Jabberwalking, coming out March 2018 through Candlewick Press. In a playful format, with his spirited illustrations, he shares his “secrets” on “how to turn your wonder at the world around you into weird, wild, incandescent poetry.” As Herrera puts it in Jabberwalking: “There’s no stopping once you are a Jabber Walker – a bonified poet on the tangly streets of the planet where human beings breathe as best they can and slap their hands in the air to greet the sun where periods and dashes and verbs and nouns come flying.”
Mr. Herrera’s other honors include a PEN Center USA Poetry Award, two Américas Awards, two Pura Belpré Author Award Honors, an Ezra Jack Keats New Writer Award, and a Los Angeles Times Book Prize Robert Kirsch Award for lifetime achievement. According to The New York Times Book Review, “The fire that appears again and again in Herrera’s poetry exists to illuminate, to make beautiful, to purify,” and The Washington Post calls his work “performative, and communal. In this sense, his work speaks powerfully to younger poets and audiences.”
*Please note that the book signing will be conducted on a first-come, first-served basis. Upon entering the theater, people wishing to have books signed will be given a number, and the book signing will take place in numerical order after the on-stage presentation.
