Pulitzer prize winning poet, Rae Armantrout, was invited to speak at Hong Kong City University’s summer writing workshop and conference program. She traveled to Hong Kong for the first time in support of her new book, Just Saying, where she also gave a talk on the uncanny and met with students from around the world.

Armantrout says,“Last July I was fortunate to be invited to participate in Hong Kong City University’s summer writing workshop and conference program. I spent several hours with talented students from South Africa, Korea, Texas, and other far flung places. I also gave a talk on ” the uncanny” in poetry (what possessed me to do that?) and read a bit from Just Saying.”

 

The poet and literary critic, Mark Scroggins, in his analysis for Parnassus notes, “Armantrout’s intelligence is constantly probing beneath the surface of what she observes, drawing offbeat conclusions from ordinary data…One might be tempted to call Armantrout a kind of laureate of the everyday, if that title weren’t being vied for by so many poets. I’m tempted instead to think of her as the laureate of the uncanny, the Unheimliche, that which is familiar and unsettling at the same time.”

“It was my first time in Hong Kong,” Armantrout says, “a city that is often both overwhelming and startling. I was lucky my husband was around to take photos.” Below are some photos of the trip.