Spring 2025 Worldbuilding Distinguished Lecture with Talia Lakshmi Kolluri
Event description
- Academic events
"Into the Animal Body: Wild Narratives for a World on Fire"
March 25, 2025, 1:30-3pm | Arizona State University, Memorial Union 202 (Alumni Lounge)
Join ASU's Worldbuilding Initiative as we welcome Talia Lakshmi Kolluri as our Spring 2025 Distinguished Lecturer.
Lecture Description
In a world that is being transformed by the accelerating effects of the climate crisis, how can we better understand the experiences of the animals we share this planet with? Join Talia Lakshmi Kolluri as she weaves selected readings from her debut collection, "What We Fed To The Manticore," with reflections on the inspiration behind her animal-narrated stories. In this dynamic lecture and reading, Talia will discuss the work of imagination necessary to reframe our vision of the world to be more expansive, more tender, and more than human.
Speaker Information
Talia Lakshmi Kolluri is a mixed South Asian American writer from Northern California. Her debut collection of short stories, What We Fed to the Manticore (Tin House 2022), was a finalist for the 2023 Carol Shields Prize for Fiction and the 2023 Northern California Book Award for Fiction; was longlisted for the 2023 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction, the 2023 Aspen Words Literary Prize, and the 2023 Pen/Robert W. Bingham Prize for Debut Short Story Collection, and was selected as a 2023 ALA/RUSA Notable Book. Her short fiction has been published in Ecotone, Southern Humanities Review, The Common, One Story, Orion, and elsewhere.
A lifelong Californian, Talia lives in the Central Valley with her husband and two cats.
This is a hybrid event. To join us virtually via Zoom, choose the "virtual" option on the registration page. Virtual attendees will receive the Zoom link 24 hours before the event begins.