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Visiting Writer Series returns this month
September 14, 2007
The Visiting Writer Series returns this fall with three authors scheduled to read from their work and host question and answer sessions between now and November.
The series gives students the opportunity to see and hear contemporary writers. Prior to each reading, the author hosts a question and answer session called the Writer’s Story, which gives students the chance to ask the writers questions about what their life is like and why they chose that path.
Each of the fall readings will take place at 8 p.m. in room 100 of Ingram Hall. The Writer’s Story event will happen at 5 p.m. at the Garfield Book Company at PLU, located on the corner of Pacific Avenue and Garfield Street.
Author Brenda Miller (pictured) begins the series with a reading from her book, “Season of the Body,” on Wednesday, Sept. 19.
Miller’s debut collection is a spiritual autobiography told in essay form. The personal essays vary from the lyric to the narrative to the humorous, but maintain her authentic voice as she explores personal joys and heartbreaks within the larger domain of life.
The book was a finalist for the PEN American Center Book Award in creative nonfiction and the Forward Jewish Book of the Year. She co-authored the text “Tell it Slant: Writing and Shaping Creative Nonfiction.” Miller’s work has received four Pushcart Prizes and appeared in such periodicals as Witness, The Sun, Utne Reader, Fourth Genre, and Creative Nonfiction.
Currently, she is an associate professor of English at Western Washington University and teaches in PLU’s low-residency master of fine arts in creative writing program, the Rainier Writing Workshop. Miller also serves as the editor-in-chief of the Bellingham Review.
The series continues with author Achy Obejas on Thursday, Oct. 11.
Internationally acclaimed for her activism and writing, Obejas is the author of “Days of Awe, Memory Mambo, and We Came all the Way from Cuba to Dress Like This?” The book depicts Alejandra San Jose, born in Havana on the day Fidel Castro seizes power. Her family flees to North America, but eventually San Jose is drawn back to her native country and must come to terms with her family’s past.
Obejas was born in Havana, Cuba, and came to the United States with her family six years after the Cuban revolution. She spent ten years writing for the Chicago Tribune, covering Pope John Paul II’s historic 1998 visit to Cuba, the arrival of Al-Queda prisoners in Guantanamo, the Versace murder and the AIDS epidemic.
Her awards are numerous and include a Pulitzer Prize for Journalism, a National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) fellowship in poetry and the Lambda Award for Lesbian Fiction. She is currently the Sor Juana Visiting Writer at DePaul University in Chicago. Her collection of poems, “This is What Happened in Our Other Life,” and an edited collection of stories, “Havana Noir,” are due to be published this fall.
The fall series concludes on Thursday, Nov. 29 with a reading by poet Michael Dumanis.
Born in the former Soviet Union, Dumanis lived there until his parents were granted political asylum in the United States. His first poetry collection, “My Soviet Union,” won the Juniper Prize in Poetry for 2006. In his book, the speaker of the funny and devastating poems hails from a country that, like the Soviet Union, no longer exists.
Dumanis holds a bachelor’s degree from Johns Hopkins University, a master of fine arts in poetry from the University of Iowa and a doctorate in creative writing from the University of Houston.
Previously an assistant professor of English at Nebraska Wesleyan University, Dumanis is currently the coeditor of the anthology “Legitimate Dangers: American Poets of the New Century.” He is also a member of English faculty at Cleveland State University and directs the Cleveland State University Poetry Center.
Sponsored by the English department, the series is also supported by contributions from the Office of the Provost, the Wild Hope Foundation, the Garfield Book Company at PLU, the Rainier Writing Workshop, Student Involvement and Leadership, Residential Life and ASPLU. Obeja’s visit is also co-sponsored by the languages and literatures department.
For more information, contact the English department at ext. 7321.
Each of the fall readings will take place at 8 p.m. in room 100 of Ingram Hall. The Writer’s Story event will happen at 5 p.m. at the Garfield Book Company at PLU, located on the corner of Pacific Avenue and Garfield Street.
Author Brenda Miller (pictured) begins the series with a reading from her book, “Season of the Body,” on Wednesday, Sept. 19.
Miller’s debut collection is a spiritual autobiography told in essay form. The personal essays vary from the lyric to the narrative to the humorous, but maintain her authentic voice as she explores personal joys and heartbreaks within the larger domain of life.
The book was a finalist for the PEN American Center Book Award in creative nonfiction and the Forward Jewish Book of the Year. She co-authored the text “Tell it Slant: Writing and Shaping Creative Nonfiction.” Miller’s work has received four Pushcart Prizes and appeared in such periodicals as Witness, The Sun, Utne Reader, Fourth Genre, and Creative Nonfiction.
Currently, she is an associate professor of English at Western Washington University and teaches in PLU’s low-residency master of fine arts in creative writing program, the Rainier Writing Workshop. Miller also serves as the editor-in-chief of the Bellingham Review.
The series continues with author Achy Obejas on Thursday, Oct. 11.
Internationally acclaimed for her activism and writing, Obejas is the author of “Days of Awe, Memory Mambo, and We Came all the Way from Cuba to Dress Like This?” The book depicts Alejandra San Jose, born in Havana on the day Fidel Castro seizes power. Her family flees to North America, but eventually San Jose is drawn back to her native country and must come to terms with her family’s past.
Obejas was born in Havana, Cuba, and came to the United States with her family six years after the Cuban revolution. She spent ten years writing for the Chicago Tribune, covering Pope John Paul II’s historic 1998 visit to Cuba, the arrival of Al-Queda prisoners in Guantanamo, the Versace murder and the AIDS epidemic.
Her awards are numerous and include a Pulitzer Prize for Journalism, a National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) fellowship in poetry and the Lambda Award for Lesbian Fiction. She is currently the Sor Juana Visiting Writer at DePaul University in Chicago. Her collection of poems, “This is What Happened in Our Other Life,” and an edited collection of stories, “Havana Noir,” are due to be published this fall.
The fall series concludes on Thursday, Nov. 29 with a reading by poet Michael Dumanis.
Born in the former Soviet Union, Dumanis lived there until his parents were granted political asylum in the United States. His first poetry collection, “My Soviet Union,” won the Juniper Prize in Poetry for 2006. In his book, the speaker of the funny and devastating poems hails from a country that, like the Soviet Union, no longer exists.
Dumanis holds a bachelor’s degree from Johns Hopkins University, a master of fine arts in poetry from the University of Iowa and a doctorate in creative writing from the University of Houston.
Previously an assistant professor of English at Nebraska Wesleyan University, Dumanis is currently the coeditor of the anthology “Legitimate Dangers: American Poets of the New Century.” He is also a member of English faculty at Cleveland State University and directs the Cleveland State University Poetry Center.
Sponsored by the English department, the series is also supported by contributions from the Office of the Provost, the Wild Hope Foundation, the Garfield Book Company at PLU, the Rainier Writing Workshop, Student Involvement and Leadership, Residential Life and ASPLU. Obeja’s visit is also co-sponsored by the languages and literatures department.
For more information, contact the English department at ext. 7321.