Bernard Hirsch Herman Memorial Lecture: Karisma Price

The Bernard Hirsch Herman Memorial Lecture is a meaningful Newman tradition, with students benefitting from the insights of inspiring writers and innovative thinkers, which allows students to connect with a diverse range of speakers and themes during their years in the Upper School. 

 

We were thrilled to welcome this year’s Bernard Hirsch Herman Lecture Honoree, poet Karisma Price, to the Henson Auditorium. Price is an Assistant Professor of English at Tulane University. Her work has appeared in several publications including 64 Parishes, Indiana Review, Oxford American, Poetry Magazine, and The Adroit Journal, to name a few. She is a Cave Canem Fellow, was a finalist for the 2019 Manchester Poetry Prize, was awarded the 2020 J. Howard and Barbara M. J. Wood Prize from the Poetry Foundation, and is the 2023 winner of the Stanley Kunitz Memorial Prize from the American Poetry Review. 

 

A poet, screenwriter, and media artist, Price is the author of I'm Always So Serious (Sarabande Books, 2023). Within the acknowledgments section of this published work, Price writes, “To anyone who’s ever read my poetry when they could be doing literally anything else with their wild and precious life. Dear readers, I thank you. And finally to New Orleans and all its existences: past, present, and future. I am made from you. May no water wash us away. I will forever remain faithful to you.”

 

Price attended the Summerbridge program (now known as Breakthrough New Orleans) on Newman’s campus for three summers as a middle school student before making her way to New York University where she went on to get a Master of Fine Arts in poetry and was a Writers in the Public Schools Fellow. During the lecture Price remarked about the importance of that experience and chuckled as she reflected that the last time she was on the Henson Auditorium stage was as a Summerbridge student, participating in a modern retelling of The Odyssey. As the student moderators for the lecture reflected back to Price, we are grateful to have her back on campus, sharing insights into her artistic process with the Newman community.

 

When asked about the transition from being a student to a published author, Price mentioned the important role that education has played throughout her entire journey.  “In the seventh grade I took my first writing/poetry class and one day in class I thought – ‘You know what, I’m going to do it. I’m going to become a poet.’ I didn’t know how, but I knew I was going to do it,” Price said.

 

“I think I had a mix of passion, a bit of delusion, and an unwavering desire to make it happen. And so it has,” Price added with a smile.

 

“Education was very important in my childhood. I was a big reader. Listening to family stories, it turned me into a family archivist. I always wanted to capture moments. Particularly after Hurricane Katrina,” Price said. Student panelists remarked on the poems Price has written surrounding Katrina and asked how the storm has affected her, both as a person and as a writer. “Water comes up a lot in my poetry. A lot of people from New Orleans have a really strong allegiance to this city. That was one of the first times I actually left this city, and it was because of dire circumstances," Price said.

 

“That experience (Hurricane Katrina) made me very observant, especially about how people treat other when they are in a time of need,” Price said. “A lot of my writing feels urgent. I tend to write things from a pre and post Katrina landscape, because a lot of things that were here aren’t here anymore. There are some things that are here now that won’t be here in the future. Archiving these moments and those feelings, it’s really important.”

 

“I've learned that it can be important to feel that we have control over certain situations in our lives. For me, I feel most articulate and in control on the page.”