Peter Balakian to read from new book “New York Trilogy” at Columbia

The Columbia University Armenian Center will host Peter Balakian for a reading and discussion on Monday, October 27, 2025, at 4 p.m., at Faculty House (Entrance on 116th St. between Amsterdam and Morningside Drive).

Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Balakian will read from his new book, New York Trilogy, an American long poem in three sections that moves between decades of tumultuous life in New York City and the Middle East.

In inventive, elliptical language, New York Trilogy explores one man’s journey from the late 1960s to the twenty-first century as he moves through a series of experiences centered in New York City and the New Jersey Palisades. Comprised of three multisequence poems originally included in Balakian’s collections No Sign, Ozone Journal and Ziggurat, the sections of New York Trilogy come together to form a poetry that embraces interior and aesthetic experiences, celebrates human intimacy and bears witness to history.

Peter Balakian is the author of nine books of poems, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning Ozone Journal. His memoir Black Dog of Fate won the PEN/Martha Albrand Award, and The Burning Tigris: The Armenian Genocide and America’s Response was a New York Times bestseller. Balakian’s work has been translated into many languages; he teaches at Colgate University.

The event is organized by the Columbia University Armenian Center, and co-sponsored by the Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies (MESAAS) at Columbia University and the National Association for Armenian Studies and Research (NAASR).

A reception will follow the reading and discussion.

Registration is required by Friday, October 24.
To register, email Prof. Khatchig Mouradian at km3253@columbia.edu
For details, visit: https://events.columbia.edu/go/Balakian