Metropolitan Detroit authors Naomi Long Madgett, poet laureate of Detroit, and Eddie Allen, Jr., freelance writer and biographer, will read from their publications and sign books at a special Black History Month event on February 27 at 2 p.m. in the Community Room on the 3rd floor of the David Adamany Undergraduate Library on the campus of Wayne State University. Sponsored by the Africana Studies Department and the Library System, this event is open to all attendees at no charge.

Detroit Poet Laureate Naomi Long Madgett has been well recognized for her contributions as poet, publisher, editor and educator. She is the author of nine poetry books, the first published when she was only seventeen years old. Her poems have appeared internationally in numerous journals and 185 anthologies. Octavia and Other Poems was co-winner of the College Language Association’s “Creative Achievement Award” and is required reading for all Detroit public high schools.

Eddie B. Allen Jr. is the author of the biography Low Road: The Life and Legacy of Donald Goines. An award-winning newspaper and magazine journalist, he has contributed to articles published in the New York Times and USA Today, as well as writing for numerous publications, including the Detroit News, the Toledo Blade, the Metro Times and African American Family Magazine. Allen’s one-man play, “The Resurrection of Malcolm X,” has been produced and performed by Ohio’s New Works Writers Series at museums and colleges.

For more information please contact the Department of Africana Studies at 313-577-2321 or the Library System at 313-577-4373.

Wayne State University is a premier institution offering more than 350 academic programs through 11 schools and colleges to more than 33,000 students in metropolitan Detroit.