Plains Song Review writers to read April 22 at Great Plains Art Museum

"For me, Nebraska keeps finding a way into poems, even when I was living in California. I'd write about my environment, but it was kind of my environment paired against or with Nebraska," poet Matt Mason writes in the latest issue of Plains Song Review, published by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's Center for Great Plains Studies. An interview with Mason by UNL students Katie Sisneros and Janey Strobel is the lead article in the journal and prepares the reader for the essays, poetry and photographs that follow.

The center will host a reading by writers and an exhibit by photographers whose work appears in Volume 11 of Plains Song Review at 7 p.m. April 22 in the Great Plains Art Museum, 1155 Q St. The Christine Pappas Award for best work by an undergraduate student will be presented by Charles A. Braithwaite, editor of Great Plains Quarterly, who served as consulting editor of Plains Song Review. The award is a cash prize of $200. A reception will precede the reading.

The evening will feature readings by authors whose work is published in this new issue. Plains Song Review publishes poetry, prose, photographs, and artwork by undergraduate and graduate students from the University of Nebraska's campuses as well as other writers and artists from Nebraska and surrounding plains states.

"Each author or photographer who submits to us finds themselves tied in some small but significant way to the heart of the United States -- the Great Plains," said Sisneros, the editor of the review. Sisneros, a UNL graduate student in English, headed a student and community editorial board that was responsible for reviewing and selecting the final entries from more than 250 submissions. Members of the board included Kaitlin Ek, Joel Gehringer, Jessica Northup, Nick Salestrom and Janey Strobel.

Sisneros started a blog last fall to expand the journal's print presence and to create a more interactive relationship with writers and poets. That blog can be found at www.plainssongreview.blogspot.com.

Plains Song Review, founded in 1999 by Christine Pappas, is an interdisciplinary literary journal, published by the Center for Great Plains Studies, that explores a sense of place on the Great Plains through the writings, photography and artwork of emerging and established writers and artists. Volume 11 will be for sale at the special rate of $5 at the reading.

The reading, exhibit, and reception are free and open to the public. For more information, call (402) 472-3082.