It’s National Poetry Month! We were originally going to talk about the incredible selection of poetry we have available at the UGL, but another event has stolen our attention: April Absurdity! Although it is a shame that we can’t point readers to great works such as current Poet Laureate Charles Wright’s 2014 Pulitzer Prize winner Black Zodiac, your chance to give the UGL courtyard tree a nickname is too important.
UGL April Absurdity 2015
April is an exciting month at the University of Illinois, as temperatures rise and students are able to enjoy time outside. We won’t suggest reading Wendell Berry’s The Broken Ground, even though it would be a great way to celebrate nature and the good weather we have been getting, so instead we hope that you will participate in naming the tree that gives students a glimpse of life while studying underground at the UGL. Names for the tree will be accepted between April 6 and April 13 and they can be suggested by online survey, on the whiteboard near the UGL Circulation Desk located on the Upper Level, and through Facebook and Twitter.
Student studying in UGL courtyard in 1969, photo taken from University Archives (http://ow.ly/LefGX)
During the week of April 13 through April 20, students will be able to vote for their favorite name at the UGL Circulation Desk and through the UGL’s social media. The whiteboard next to the Circulation Desk will be updated with brackets to show the progress of the names. If we didn’t have to tell you that the final name would be announced on Arbor Day (which is April 24) we could highlight some of our other books of poetry, such as Sharon Olds’s Stag’s Leap, or even a classic work like Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Collected Poems and Translations.
UGL Courtyard Tree, courtesy of Media Commons
National Poetry Month is such an exciting time at the UGL, which is why it is so upsetting that we can’t mention our books like Lucille Clifton’s Blessing the Boats: New and Selected Poems, or Adrienne Rich’s The School Among the Ruins. (See what we did there?) If you need inspiration to come up with tree names, be sure to check out Americans’ Favorite Poems: The Favorite Poem Project Anthology.
Americans’ Favorite Poems: The Favorite Poem Project Anthology
Stay up to date with April Absurdity and do your part in helping name the UGL courtyard tree!
