All Writers Forum events begin at 8:00pm, and are held in the New York Room, Cooper Hall — unless otherwise noted
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Names & Dates
Chase Twichell
Wednesday, September 23
Poetry
Born in New Haven, Connecticut, Chase Twichell earned her undergraduate degree from Trinity College, and her M.F.A. from the University of Iowa. A recipient of numerous awards, Twichell has received honors from the Artists Foundation (Boston), the New Jersey State Council on the Arts and the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She has also earned fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. Among her published works are The Snow Watcher (Ontario Review Press, 1998), The Ghost of Eden (1995), and, most recently, Dog Language (2005). She has taught at Princeton University, Goddard College, Warren Wilson College, the University of Alabama and Hampshire College. In 1999, Twichell founded Ausable Press. She lives in Keene, New York with her husband, novelist Russell Banks.
Rodney Jones
Wednesday, October 7
Poetry
Rodney Jones attended the University of Alabama and the University of North Carolina, Greensboro, where he received an M.F.A. Among his many published collections of poetry are Salvation Blues (2006), winner of the Kingsley Tufts Award and the Griffin Poetry Trust Award, Elegy for the Southern Drawl (1999), and Apocalyptic Narrative (1993). Transparent Gestures won the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1998. Among his many honors, Jones has won a Southeast Booksellers Association Award, the Peter I.B. Lavan Award from the Academy of American Poets, and a Harper Lee Award. He has also received fellowships from the National Endowment of the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation. Jones is a professor of English at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale.
Cheryl Wagner
Wednesday, October 28
Nonfiction
A Louisiana native, Cheryl Wagner is a graduate of Tulane University and the Center for Writers at the University of Southern Mississippi. Wagner has made regular appearances on public radio’s This American Life and has essays and articles published in Harper’s Magazine, the New York Times Magazine, McSweeney’s, The Mississippi Review and Five Dials. She has also been featured on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s The Current and Definitely Not the Opera. Wagner’s first book, Plenty Enough Suck to Go Around, is a memoir of her time in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina.” She won awards from the Louisiana Press Association for her cover stories on Hurricane Katrina. Wagner lives in New Orleans.
John Edgar Wideman
Wednesday, November 4
Fiction
Writers Voice, Sponsored by M&T Bank
Reading held at Brockport Downtown
John Edgar Wideman is the author of more than eighteen books of fiction and nonfiction including Two Cities, The Lynchers, God’s Gym, and Fanon.His memoir, Brothers and Keepers, was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award and Fatheralong was a finalist for the National Book Award. Wideman was twice awarded the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction— in 1984 for his novel Sent for You Yesterday and in 1990 for Philadelphia Fire. In addition, his work has won the Rea Award for the short story, the American Book Award for Fiction, the Lannan Foundation Fellowship and the MacArthur “genius” Award. Wideman is a professor in the Africana Studies Department at Brown University.
Michael Parker
Wednesday, November 18
Fiction
A native of Clinton, N.C., Michael Parker received his B.A. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and his M.F.A. from the University of Virginia. Parker is the author of the novels, Hello Down There (Scribner’s, 1993) — a New York Times Notable Book and finalist for the PEN/Hemingway prize — Towns without Rivers (2001), and If You Want Me to Stay (2005). His short fiction collection is Don’t Make Me Stop Now (2007). His stories have appeared in Oxford American, The Georgia Review and Five Points. Parker has received the North Carolina Award, the Goodheart Prize, the Sir Walter Raleigh Award and fellowships from the North Carolina Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts. He teaches in the M.F.A. Writing Program at UNC, Greensboro.
For further information
Writers Forum
350 New Campus Drive
Brockport, NY 14420
Phone: (585) 395-5713
Email: James Whorton/Anne Panning