campus news and events

Colby-Sawyer College to Host Two-Time World Champion Slam Poet Buddy Wakefield for Performance of Poetry

NEW LONDON, N.H., March 30, 2011 – Colby-Sawyer College will host two-time Individual World Champion Slam Poet Buddy Wakefield, known for delivering raw, high-vibration performances with humor and heart

Wakefield will present his poetry in Wheeler Hall at the Ware Campus Center on Monday, April 11 at 7 p.m. The event is sponsored by the Cultural Events Committee, and the public is invited to attend. Admission is free.

In 2004 Wakefield won the Individual World Poetry Slam Finals with the support of anthropologist and producer Norman Lear. In 2005 he successfully defended that title at the International Poetry Festival in Rotterdam, Netherlands, against the national champions of seven European countries with works translated into Dutch.

Wakefield has since gone on to share the stage with nearly every notable performance poet in the world in hundreds of venues from The Great Lawn in Central Park and Scotland's Oran Mor to San Quentin State Penitentiary, House of Blues New Orleans and First Avenue. He has been featured on NPR, the BBC, HBO's Def Poetry Jam, and was recently signed to Ani DiFranco's Righteous Babe Records.

Born in Shreveport, La., mostly raised in Baytown, Texas, and now claiming Seattle, Wash., as home, Wakefield has been a busker in Amsterdam, a lumberjack in Norway, a street vendor in Spain, a team leader in Singapore, a re-delivery boy, a candy maker, a street sweeper, a bartender, a maid, a construction worker, a bull rider and a triathlete. He also calls himself the “elated son of a guitar repair woman.”

In the spring of 2001 Wakefield left his position as the executive assistant at a biomedical firm in Gig Harbor, Wash., sold or gave away everything he owned and set out to “live for a living,” touring North American poetry venues through 2003. He still tours full time and considers his annual Poetry Revival tours with Derrick Brown and Anis Mojgani, as well as separate tours with Ani DiFranco, to be the highlight of his career thus far.

A member of Youth Speaks Seattle's board of directors, Wakefield has been published internationally in dozens of books with work used to win multiple national collegiate debate and forensics competitions. He is the author of Write Bloody Publishing, a collection of poetry. To learn more about Buddy Wakefield and listen to some of his poetry, visit http://buddywakefield.com.

For other upcoming events at Colby-Sawyer, visit www.colby-sawyer.edu/events

-Cassandra Monahan '11

Colby-Sawyer College is a comprehensive college that integrates the liberal arts and sciences with professional preparation. Founded in 1837, Colby-Sawyer is located in the scenic Lake Sunapee Region of central New Hampshire.