Snyder

Cornell Plantations kicks off its annual fall lecture series Wednesday, Aug. 24, with the William and Jane Torrence Harder Lecture by Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, conservationist and scholar Gary Snyder at 5:30 p.m. in Call Alumni Auditorium, Kennedy Hall. The lecture will be followed by a party in Plantations’ Botanical Garden celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Harder Family Lecture.

“I try to hold both history and wilderness in mind, that my poems may approach the true measure of things and stand against the unbalance and ignorance of our times,” Snyder has written. According to The Poetry Foundation, many of Snyder’s poems aim to instill an ecological consciousness in the reader and reflect “a concern for the environment and the plight of the American Indian as well as insights engendered by his role as a husband, father and steward of the land.”

In his lecture, Snyder will explore the concept of “bioregionalism” through the literary works of Daoist and Buddhist hermits and other peoples of the land, and how that perspective relates to the mission of Cornell Plantations. He will read several of his translations of poems by Tang dynasty poet Han Shan and some of his own poems.

“As a Guggenheim fellow and Pulitzer Prize winner who focuses his time on issues related to wildlife, ecology, indigenous cultures and bioregional philosophy, Gary Snyder is uniquely poised to tell the story of human connection to nature through his poetry and essays,” said Christopher Dunn, the E.N. Wilds Director of Cornell Plantations. “The Harders have always encouraged us to feature speakers that celebrate the link between the literary and natural world, and Mr. Snyder is a perfect choice.”

Snyder, a Zen Buddhist, mountaineer, environment activist and founding member of the beat generation, has written 16 collections of poetry and prose, including “No Nature, Mountains and Rivers Without End,” “The Practice of the Wild” and “Turtle Island.” He has been awarded the Bollingen Poetry Prize and the Robert Kirsch Lifetime Achievement Award.

Free and open to the public.