Annual Eudora Welty Writers’ Symposium to Feature Ashley M. Jones
Ashley M. Jones will return to Mississippi University for Women to keynote the 37th annual Eudora Welty Writers’ Symposium, set for Oct. 23–25, 2025. Jones will present her new poetry collection, “Lullaby for the Grieving.”
“At the Welty Symposium, literature comes alive as invited authors take to the stage and share their stories. A free event to all and unforgettable for those who come and listen as they breathe life into their own words — the way they envisioned them,” said T. Kris Lee, acting director of the Welty Symposium. “Books are great — but hearing an author tell their own story is where the magic is. So, come for the words — stay for the voice behind them.”
Jones, the youngest and first Black Alabama Poet Laureate, has appeared on Good Morning America, PBS, CNN, the BBC and ABC News, as well as in The New York Times, Mother Jones and Poets & Writers, among others.
With her latest collection, Jones will open the symposium, which carries the theme “Secrets and Revelations: A Dark Thread Running Through My Story,” inspired by Eudora Welty’s novel “Losing Battles.” Like Welty’s novel, “Lullaby for the Grieving” explores themes of family and heritage, as Jones reflects on the loss of her father, her family’s history and the challenges her community has overcome.
Jones’s keynote address will be held Thursday, Oct. 23, at 7:30 p.m. in Poindexter Hall. Sessions continue Friday from 9:30 a.m.–noon and 1:30–4 p.m., and Saturday from 9:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m.
This year’s Eudora Welty Prize for a work of scholarship will be awarded to Drea Brown for “Conjuring the Haint: The Haunting Poetics of Black Women.” Brown, a poet-scholar and associate professor of English at Texas State University, will examine the poetry of Claudia Rankine, Lucille Clifton, Phyllis Wheatley, Ntozake Shange, Sapphire and others.
Jones and Brown will be joined by Mississippi poets Kendall Dunkelberg, Olivia Clare Friedman and Samyak Shertok. Dunkelberg, director of Creative Writing at The W, will read from his fourth poetry collection, “Tree Fall with Birdsong,” which explores loss and renewal through nature and myth.
They will also be joined by Kathleen Driskell, poet laureate of Kentucky and chair of the Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing at Spalding University. Driskell’s sixth collection, “Goat-Footed Gods,” reimagines Greek and Roman myths within the landscapes of rural Kentucky.
Other Mississippi writers featured include Addie E. Citchens, whose debut novel, “Dominion” is set in a fictional Delta town near her native Clarksdale. Robert Busby will read from “Bodock,” a collection of stories set in a fictional town near his hometown of Pontotoc. Many of Busby’s stories take place in the aftermath of the 1994 ice storm or explore the town’s hidden history.
Rickey Fayne will present his debut novel, “The Devil Three Times,” which follows three generations of a West Tennessee family bound by a deal with the devil. Kirkus Reviews has described it as “a complex meditation on Black history with a Mephistophelian twist.”
Jordan LaHaye Fontenot will share her debut true-crime memoir, “Home of the Happy: A Murder on the Cajun Prairie,” which investigates the death of her great-grandfather in South Louisiana.
Lauren Rhoades, a longtime Jackson resident and graduate of The W’s MFA in Creative Writing, will read from her debut memoir “Split the Baby,” which examines her interfaith family and the effects of divorce. Rhoades is director of grants for the Mississippi Arts Commission and founding editor of Rooted Magazine.
Carrie R. Moore broadens the symposium’s scope with her debut story collection, “Make Your Way Home,” featuring Black families in search of belonging across the South, from Florida and North Carolina to Georgia and Texas.
On Friday afternoon, five winners of the Ephemera Prize, awarded to high school creative writers, will be recognized on stage. Each winner will read their entry and receive a $200 award. This year’s entries were judged by Friedman and Moore.
All symposium sessions and art exhibits are free and open to the public. No reservations are required. For Welty Gala tickets, please contact the MUW Foundation. For information on the authors, books, the Ephemera Prize and the Gala, see the Welty Series website www.muw.edu/welty.
Other Welty Series events include the Welty Gala, a university fundraiser and dinner, on Friday evening at the James M. Trotter Convention Center. The gala will feature Chef Jeff Henderson, who will discuss his journey from growing up in South Central Los Angeles and serving a prison term, to discovering a love of cooking that led him to launch successful restaurants and star in three Food Network reality series: The Chef Jeff Project, Family Style with Chef Jeff and Flip My Food with Chef Jeff.
In addition, a reception for the Welty Series art exhibit, “Intersections of Gender and Place: Alison Grant, Nia Campbell and Sarah Oden,” will be held Thursday, Oct. 23, at 5 p.m. in Summer Hall.