Novelist and poet Robert Morgan and poet and essayist Kenneth McClane will read from their works at the first Richard Cleaveland Memorial Reading at 7:30 p.m. Friday, March 3, in the Hollis E. Cornell Auditorium of Goldwin Smith Hall. The event is free and open to the public.

Cleaveland, Cornell Class of '74, died this past fall in an accident near his adopted home of Anaconda, Mont. An accomplished poet, writer and naturalist, he served as editor of a former student literary magazine called Rainy Day. His poetry was published in First Anthology, edited by A.R. Ammons, the Goldwin Smith Professor of Poetry Emeritus at Cornell. After graduation, Cleaveland went on to serve as editor and columnist for The Grapevine, a now-defunct weekly newspaper in Tompkins County that Cleaveland helped launch.

"He was here when I was an undergrad at Cornell," said McClane, the W.E.B. DuBois Professor of Literature at Cornell. "We used to have these poetry readings every Thursday night, and he would be there -- a wonderfully gruff presence -- almost without fail."

McClane is the author of eight books of poems, including Take Five: Poems 1972-1988, and a collection of personal essays, Walls: Essays 1985-1990. His work has appeared in The Best American Essays and The Jazz Poetry Anthology, among other publications. McClane's introduction to a James Baldwin documentary, called Sonny's Blues, will be broadcast on PBS.

Morgan, the Kappa Alpha Professor of English at Cornell, is the author of 10 books of poetry including the upcoming Topsoil Road. He has written three collections of short stories and three novels, including Gap Creek, which recently was named a selection of the Oprah Winfrey Book Club. Cleaveland was a student in Morgan's writing classes in the 1970s.

The reading is sponsored by the Cornell Department of English and the College of Arts and Sciences. The Richard Cleaveland Memorial Fund was created by family, friends and alumni and will be used for future readings by students and faculty.