Pauletta Hansel\, poet\, memoirist\, teach er\, winner of the 2026 Judy Gaines Young Book Award\, and the first poet laureate of Cincinnati\, celebrates the release of her latest book\, U nderstory: A Women&rsquo\;s History of Appalachia. \;Hansel blend s poetry\, memoir\, genealogy\, and history to chronicle the untold story of her foremothers. \;Poet Sara Henning praised \;Understory as a book that\, "is changing the landscape of what poetry and memoir can do." Chiquita Mullins Lee\, Arts Learning Programs Coordinator for the Ohio Arts Council\, will moderate this conversation.
\nAbou t the Author:
\nPauletta Hansel \;is a poet\, memoirist\, teacher\, and editor who has authored ten poetry colle ctions\, including \;Heartbreak Tree\, \;Palindrome\, and \;Will There Also Be Singing? \;She is the winn er of the \;2026 Judy Gaines Young Book Award \;from Transylvania University and served as the first poet laureate of Cincinnati. \;Hans el's eleventh book\, \;Understory: A Women's History of Appalachia \, blends poetry\, memoir\, genealogy\, and history and is due out in October 2026 through University Press of Kentucky.
\nAbout the Moderator:
\nChiquita Mullins Lee grew up in Atlanta\, Georgia\, and lives in Columbus\, Ohio\, where she works as Arts Learning Programs Coordinator for the Ohio Arts Council. Previousl y\, she was Ohio's Poetry Out Loud project coordinator\, as well as a teac hing artist for the Ohio Arts Council&rsquo\;s Artist-in-Residence program . She has taught creative writing in schools throughout Ohio\, at the Thur ber House and through the Wexner Center for the Arts. \;
\nFor Pauletta Hansel\, who grew up in s outheastern Kentucky\, the history of her ancestors traces back to her ten th great-grandmother\, a "tobacco bride" shipped from England to Jamestown \, Virginia\, in exchange for 150 pounds of tobacco leaves. After the Revo lutionary War\, the family migrated from the Chesapeake area to the mounta ins of North Carolina\, and eventually\, into the Appalachian coalfields. As Hansel explored archives and artifacts\, she found this ancestry was in complete\, remembered solely through the lives of men.
\nWith a capt ivating and contemplative voice\, Hansel's \;Understory \;weaves h istory\, genealogy\, and poetry to chronicle the untold story of her forem others. Hansel does not shy away from hard truths\, such as her family's e nslavement of people of African descent\, their support for the Confederac y\, and their displacement of Indigenous people. Through research\, her tr avels across the US\, and her own family stories and memories\, she makes visible those whose lives were hidden between the lines of documents left behind.
\nIn revealing generations of women whose experiences have o nly been glimpsed within others' narratives\, \;Understory \;is no t simply one family's story&mdash\;it is a microcosm of the history of App alachian American women.
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