ISSUED: 13 September 2019
MEDIA CONTACT: Valerie Owens
SHEPHERDSTOWN, WV — Shepherd University’s Society for Creative Writing is hosting The Danske Dandridge Literary Festival October 11-13. The festival will offer writing workshops, readings, a panel on translation, and question and answer sessions. Special guest Sir Andrew Motion, former poet laureate of the United Kingdom and Homewood Professor of the Arts at Johns Hopkins University, will read on Saturday, October 12, at 7 p.m. in the Erma Ora Byrd Hall auditorium. The reading, which is free and open to the public, will be followed by a question and answer session and book signing.
The festival will feature writers of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry, including Jane Brox, faculty member at Lesley University’s low-residency M.F.A. Program; Nancy Naomi Carlson, senior translation editor for Tupelo Quarterly; Jennifer Grotz, professor of English at the University of Rochester and director of the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conferences; Roser Caminals, a native of Barcelona and emerita professor of Spanish at Hood College; William Heath, professor emeritus, Mount St. Mary’s University; and Barrett Warner, co-editor of the Free State Review, a nonpartisan literary journal, and acquisitions editor for Galileo Books, a nonprofit publisher of poetry and prose collections. All events are free and open to the public unless otherwise noted.
Friday October 11
- 7 p.m., Erma Ora Byrd Hall auditorium, reading and book signing with Jane Brox and Jennifer Grotz.
Saturday October 12
- 11 a.m., Erma Ora Byrd Hall room 103, Barrett Warner, editor of the Free State Review and acquisitions editor for Galileo Press talks about writing and publishing.
- 1:30 p.m., Erma Ora Byrd Hall room 103, conversation about translation with Roser Caminals, Nancy Naomi Carlson, Jennifer Grotz, and others.
- 3-4 p.m., Scarborough Library, class with Andrew Motion; for more information and to apply contact Gabrielle Hersey at gherse01@rams.shepherd.edu.
- 6:30-7 p.m., Erma Ora Byrd Hall, music with Shepherd graduate Lucia Valentine.
- 7 p.m., Erma Ora Byrd Hall auditorium, reading with Andrew Motion followed by question and answer session and book signing, sponsored by the Scarborough Society.
Sunday October 13
- 1 p.m., Four Seasons Books, 114 W. German Street, reading by Shepherd faculty, Nancy Naomi Carlson, and Somondoco Press authors Roser Caminals, William Heath, and Barrett Warner.
The Society for Creative Writing is supported by the Shepherd University Foundation’s Scarborough Society, the President’s Circle, Shepherd Success Fund, HBP, Inc., and Four Seasons Books.
For more information go to www.shepherd.edu/societyforcreativewriting or Facebook www.facebook.com/society4creativewriting/.
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