FRANKFORT, Ky. (April 21, 2025) – After a scheduling change, renowned writers and former Kentucky Poets Laureate Crystal Wilkinson and Frank X Walker will host a New Kentucky Home experience, leading individual writing workshops at General Butler State Resort Park on June 16-17. These workshops are open to the public and will include guided discussions and sessions with both literary luminaries.
The workshop will kick off on the evening of Monday, June 16, with dinner followed by a writing session. Attendees will have a unique opportunity to choose their workshop schedule – participants can work with Crystal Wilkinson on the first day and with Frank X Walker on the second day or vice versa. The workshop will conclude with a morning session on Tuesday, June 17.
Several package options are available for participants. The lodging package, which includes the workshop, an overnight stay on Friday, dinner on Friday and breakfast on Saturday, is priced at $275 plus tax for single occupancy and $325 plus tax for double occupancy. For those who prefer to attend only during the day, a day package that includes the workshop and one meal costs $150 plus tax, while a day package without a meal is available for $125 plus tax. With a valid student ID, students can receive the day rate package for $100 plus tax. To learn more about the package options and to register, please visit parks.ky.gov/writing-workshop. Spots for this workshop are limited, and registration operates on a first-come, first-served basis.
Crystal Wilkinson is the award-winning author of “Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts,” a national-bestselling culinary memoir; “Perfect Black,” a collection of poems; and three works of fiction – “The Birds of Opulence,” “Water Street” and “Blackberries, Blackberries.” She is the recipient of an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Poetry, an O. Henry Prize, an Academy of American Poets Fellowship, a USA Artists Fellowship and an Ernest J. Gaines Prize for Literary Excellence. She was the 2021-2022 Poet Laureate of Kentucky. She currently teaches creative writing at the University of Kentucky where she is a Bush-Holbrook endowed professor and director of the Division of Creative Writing. Her memoir “Heartsick” is forthcoming from Crown.
Frank X Walker was the first African-American writer to be named Kentucky Poet Laureate (2013-2014). Walker has published 13 collections of poetry, including “Turn Me Loose: The Unghosting of Medgar Evers,” which was awarded the 2014 NAACP Image Award for Poetry and the Black Caucus American Library Association Honor Award for Poetry. Voted one of the most creative professors in the south, Walker coined the term “Affrilachia” and co-founded the Affrilachian Poets, subsequently publishing the much-celebrated eponymous collection. Walker is the founding editor of “pluck! The Journal of Affrilachian Arts & Culture” and serves as professor of English and African American and Africana Studies at the University of Kentucky in Lexington. His most recent collection is “Masked Man, Black: Pandemic & Protest Poems.”
This workshop continues Kentucky State Parks’ partnership with Kentucky writers, following the successful writing workshops held in 2024 as part of its 100th Anniversary Celebration.
Kentucky is home to 44 state parks, including 17 resort parks and 13 golf courses. For additional information about Kentucky State Parks, please visit parks.ky.gov.