Award Winning Poet Wesley McNair will launch his new book at the University of Maine at Farmington Visiting Writers Series April 1. FARMINGTON — Wesley McNair, Professor Emeritus and Writer in Residence at the University of Maine at Farmington, is the next poet in the 2009-10 Visiting Writers Series.

McNair will launch his new book, “Lovers of the Lost: New & Selected Poems,” at the UMF reading held at 7:30 p.m., Thursday, April 1, in The Landing in the UMF Olsen Student Center. The reading is free and open to the public and will be followed by a signing by the author.

“Lovers of the Lost” represents over 40 years of McNair’s poetry, described by the Ruminator Review as “one of the most individual bodies of work by a poet of his generation.” His poems have also drawn praise from a number of poets. Several of the narratives of his new book are derived from the people and rural life of the Farmington area, where many of his poems have been written.

He recently read his poems at the Library of Congress and was selected for a United States Artists Fellowship as one of “America’s finest living artists.”

A guest editor in poetry for the 2010 Pushcart Prize anthology, McNair has served four times on the nominating jury for the Pulitzer Prize in poetry. He has written or edited 18 books, including anthologies, essays and poetry.

McNair directed the creative writing program at the University of Maine at Farmington and received the Distinguished Faculty Award and the Libra Professorship. He also served as a visiting creative writing professor at Colby College.

This event is presented by the University of Maine at Farmington’s Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program.