Willis Barnstone taught in Greece at the end of the civil war (1949-51), in Buenos Aires during the Dirty War, and during the Cultural Revolution went to China, where he was later a Fulbright Professor of American Literature at Beijing Foreign Studies University (1984-1985); Aliki Barnstone is a poet, translator, critic, and editor; and Tony Barnstone is The Albert Upton Professor of English Language and Literature at Whittier College and holds a Masters in English and Creative Writing and Ph.D. in English Literature from U.C. Berkeley.

Author and/or editor of more than 25 volumes or poetry, Naomi Shihab Nye will read selections from her work.