Join us on Thursday, October 10th at the Civitella Castle for Emily Riddle & Raisa Tolchinsky Presentations. We will welcome you with light refreshments at 6:00 PM.


Emily Riddle

Writing, Canada

2024 Canadian Griffin Poetry Prize Affiliated Fellow

Emily Riddle is Nehiyaw and a member of the Alexander First Nation (Kipohtakaw). She is a writer, researcher, textile artist, community organizer, and editor based in Amisko Waciw Wâskahikan (Edmonton, Canada). In 2022, she released her first full length poetry collection, The Big Melt which won the Griffin Poetry Prize Canadian first book award. Her writing has been published in The Malahat ReviewCanadian ArtThe Washington PostThe Globe and Mail, among others. She is currently working on a poetry book about water and a novel about one of her relatives from the fur trade era.

Raisa Tolchinsky

Writing, USA

2024 Lexi Rudnitsky/Persea Books First Book Prize Affiliated Fellow

Raisa Tolchinsky is the author of the poetry collection Glass Jaw (Persea Books, 2024), winner of the 2023 Lexi Rudnitsky First Book Prize. She has published poems in Boston ReviewKenyon ReviewMichigan Quarterly Review, and elsewhere. Raisa earned her MFA from the University of Virginia and her B.A. from Bowdoin College. She was the 2022–2023 George Bennett Writer-in-Residence at Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire and is a graduate of Harvard Divinity School. Previously, Raisa lived in Chicago, Bologna, and New York City, where she trained as a boxer.

Thursday, October 10th, 2024
6:00 PM Welcome cocktail 
6:15 PM Presentations
Please RSVP here