NORA SMITH
Staff writer
Emmy Award-winning poet and founding Poet Laureate Emerita of Buffalo Jillian Hanesworth will return to Chautauqua Institution for a reading and Masters Series Masterclass after serving as a guest judge for the 2026 Chautauqua Prize.
“I’ve gotten to work alongside Chautauqua in a few different capacities over the past few years,” Hanesworth said. “I’m just really grateful for what I’ve been able to learn from that community and for opportunities that Chautauqua gives me to grow as an artist.”
Hanesworth was first invited to Chautauqua in 2022 as part of the Interfaith Lecture Series, where she was scheduled to speak on the same day as Salman Rushdie, but her lecture was canceled following the attack on Rushdie. In 2023, she was invited back to the Institution through the Department of Religion and later returned that season for the Kwame Alexander Writers’ Retreat and as a speaker for the 2025 Forum on Democracy.
“They just keep inviting me, and I keep coming back, and I love it,” Hanesworth said. “I try to get there at least once every summer. I’m just glad to be a small part of that community now.”
Hanesworth will return to Chautauqua for a reading of “The People’s Poet” at 12:15 p.m. today on the porch of Alumni Hall, in addition to teaching a Master Series Masterclass “Write On: Writing for a Revolution with Jillian Hanesworth” from 4:30 to 6 p.m. Thursday in the Alumni Hall Ballroom with a registration fee of $45.
Interim Michael I. Rudell Director of Literary Arts Stephine Hunt said during the reading, Hanesworth will talk about growing up in Buffalo, New York, and her journey in becoming a writer and the Inaugural Poet Laureate Emerita of Buffalo, in addition to reading her poem, “The People’s Poet.”
“She’s going to be talking about revolutionary writers like James Baldwin, and how she uses [revolutionary writers’] influence to write and how other people can use influential writers of revolutions and become revolutionary writers themselves,” Hunt said.
Hanesworth’s workshop description reads: “This workshop will offer participants the opportunity to grapple with the social and political climate we face as a nation and write poetry that encourages hope, truth and change.”
Hunt said audience members should come ready to learn about numerous things.
“I would say come ready to learn both about some of the historical revolutionary writers that we celebrate in the United States, that are both canonical and that they may not have heard of, and to be willing to dive into an understanding of how poetry itself lends itself to revolutionary ideas,” Hunt said.
