TUSCALOOSA, Ala. -- Charles Simic will read a selection from his latest work at 7:30 p.m. on March 18 in the Rast B room of the Bryant Conference Center at The University of Alabama as part of the Bankhead Visiting Writers Series.

Simic is the author of 16 books of poetry, five books of essays, a memoir and several books of translations. He was the guest editor of “Best American Poetry” (1992), and was elected Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets in 2000.

A Pulitzer Prize winner for “The World Doesn’t End: Prose Poems” (1990), Simic has received many awards for his work, including fellowships from the MacArthur Foundation, the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. “Voices at 3 A.M.,” his book of selected and new poems, was just published in April 2003. He teaches at the University of New Hampshire.

In addition to the Thursday reading, Simic will lead an informal question-and- answer session in 301 Morgan Hall at noon on Friday, March 19.

The Bankhead Visiting Writers Series is made possible by an endowment from the Bankhead Foundation, The University of Alabama’s Program in Creative Writing, the Department of English and the College of Arts and Sciences. For more information, please contact UA’s creative writing program at 205/348-0766 or visit www.bama.ua.edu/~writing.