On Friday, April 11, poet Pauletta Hansel gave a reading of her work, as part of the 4th annual poetry celebration going on all month long here at RWC.Ms. Hansel began writing as a young girl in grade school. She continued to write through junior high and high school and had some of her early work published in magazines such as Scholastic and journals interested in Appalachian writing.
She talked about losing her voice and how she quit writing in her early twenties. She pushed her lifelong dream aside for many years and didn’t write again until her mid-thirties. Seven years later her first book, “Divining,” was published. “Divining” is a compilation of poems written from 1995-2000. Most of her poems are about her family and her life as a writer.
Ms. Hansel has achieved such as honors as Ohio poet of the year, and she currently works with the Urban Appalachian Counsel and Women Writing For A Change, an organization that encourages and celebrates the writing of women from all walks of life.
Ms. Hansel says, “One of the things that inspires me is my work with women and girls that may not think of themselves as writers, but have stories to tell.