May 10, Monday -- Author Tony Hunt will talk with Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Gary Snyder about the making of the poet's 1996 opus "Mountains and Rivers Without End" in a free public talk. Hailed as a major contribution to American letters, the volume heralded Snyder's reception of the 1997 Bollingen Prize for poetry as well as the 1997 John Hay Award for Nature Writing. Hunt recently published "Genesis, Structure and Meaning in Gary Snyder's Mountains and Rivers Without End," (2004) which offers the first extended critical study of Snyder's long poem. He looks at Japanese Nô drama, Native American folklore, Buddhist philosophy, watershed hydrology, cultural politics and numerous other influences woven throughout the book-length poem. Sponsored by the Pacific Regional Humanities Center at UC Davis, the hour-long talk begins at noon in Room 126 Voorhies Hall on the UC Davis campus.