George Mason University’s Creative Writing Program joins Mason’s University Libraries and Watershed Lit in presenting the Fall 2022 Visiting Writers Series, which will feature two writers each in fiction, nonfiction, and poetry.
Writers will meet for virtual afternoon workshops with students from Mason’s MFA program in creative writing and will then participate in programs that same evening—open to the public and combining brief readings and conversation with hosts from Mason’s creative writing community.
All evening programs will begin at 7:30 p.m. on Crowdcast, with the exception of the October 13 event with Okezie Nwoka, which will begin at 6 p.m. in person in the Fenwick Library Reading Room on Mason’s Fairfax Campus in partnership with Fall for the Book.
Visit creativewriting.gmu.edu for updated information ahead.
NOVUYO ROSA TSHUMA (FICTION) — Thursday, September 15
In conversation with Mason professor Alexia Arthurs
Novuyo Rosa Tshuma is a 2020 Lannan Fiction Fellow and the author of the novel House of Stone, winner of a 2019 Edward Stanford Travel Writing Award and the 2019 Bulawayo Arts Award for Outstanding Fiction, and listed for the 2019 Orwell Prize, the 2019 Dylan Thomas Prize, the 2019 Rathbones Folio Prize, and the 2020 Balcones Fiction Prize. She has been invited to give public lectures about House of Stone at the University of Oxford, the Nordic Africa Institute, and Vassar College. Novuyo is a native of Zimbabwe and has lived in South Africa and the USA. Her novella-and-short story collection Shadows was published by Kwela in South Africa to critical acclaim and won the 2014 Herman Charles Bosman Prize. The recipient of the 2009 Yvonne Vera Award, Zimbabwe's short fiction prize, Novuyo’s writing has been featured in numerous anthologies, most recently McSweeney’s, Ploughshares, and The Displaced, edited by Viet Thanh Nguyen. Novuyo has taught fiction at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and serves as an Assistant Professor of fiction at Emerson College. Her second novel, I Dream America, is forthcoming with W. W. Norton. www.novuyotshuma.com/
ERIN KEANE (NONFICTION) — Thursday, September 29
In conversation with MFA alum Abi Newhouse
Erin Keane is the author of the memoir Runaway: Notes on the Myths that Made Me (forthcoming September 27 from Belt Publishing). A critic, poet, essayist, and journalist, she’s the author of three collections of poetry, and editor of The Louisville Anthology (Belt Publishing). Her writing has appeared in many publications and anthologies, and in 2018, she coproduced and cohosted the limited audio series These Miracles Work: A Hold Steady Podcast. She is editor in chief at Salon, where she has worked since 2014, and teaches in the Sena Jeter Naslund-Karen Mann Graduate School of Writing at Spalding University. https://twitter.com/eekshecried
OKEZIE NWỌKA (FICTION) — Thursday, October 13, 6 p.m. in the Fenwick Library Reading Room on Mason’s Fairfax Campus—part of the Fall for the Book Festival
In conversation with Mason professor Alexia Arthurs
Okezie Nwọka was born and raised in Washington, D.C. They are a graduate of Brown University and attended the Iowa Writers’ Workshop as a Dean Graduate Research Fellow. They are presently teaching and living in their hometown. God of Mercy is their first novel. www.okezienwoka.com
DANA LEVIN (POETRY) — Thursday, October 27
In conversation with Mason professor Peter Streckfus
Dana Levin’s new book of poetry is Now Do You Know Where You Are (Copper Canyon Press, 2022), a Lannan Literary Selection. Her first book, In the Surgical Theatre, was chosen by Louise Glück for the 1999 American Poetry Review/Honickman First Book Prize and went on to receive numerous honors, including the 2003 PEN/Osterweil Award. Copper Canyon Press brought out her second book, Wedding Day, in 2005, and in 2011 Sky Burial, which The New Yorker called “utterly her own and utterly riveting.” Sky Burial was noted for 2011 year-end honors by The New Yorker, the San Francisco Chronicle, Coldfront, and Library Journal. Her fourth book, Banana Palace, was a finalist for the Rilke Prize. Levin’s poetry and essays have appeared in many anthologies and magazines, including Best American Poetry, The New York Times, Boston Review, The American Poetry Review, Poetry, and The Nation. Her fellowships and awards include those from the National Endowment for the Arts, PEN, the Witter Bynner Foundation and the Library of Congress, as well as the Rona Jaffe, Whiting and Guggenheim Foundations. A teacher of poetry for over thirty years, Levin has served as the Russo Endowed Chair in Creative Writing at the University of New Mexico (2009–2011), as well as Faculty and Chair of the Creative Writing and Literature Department at College of Santa Fe (1998–2009) and Santa Fe University of Art and Design (2011–2015). She has taught for the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College since 2002. Levin currently serves as Distinguished Writer in Residence at Maryville University in St. Louis. www.danalevinpoet.com/
KATHRYN SCHULZ (NONFICTION) — Thursday, November 3
In conversation with MFA alum Christa Spillson
Kathryn Schulz is a staff writer at The New Yorker. She won a National Magazine Award and a Pulitzer Prize in 2015 for “The Really Big One,” an article about seismic risk in the Pacific Northwest. Her new book, Lost & Found, grew out of “Losing Streak,” which was originally published in The New Yorker and later anthologized in The Best American Essays. Her other essays and reporting have appeared in The Best American Science and Nature Writing, The Best American Travel Writing, and The Best American Food Writing. A native of Ohio, she lives with her family on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.
SUSAN TICHY (POETRY) — Thursday, November 17
In conversation with Mason MFA alum Tracy Zeman
Susan Tichy is the author of seven books of poetry, most recently North | Rock | Edge: Shetland (Free Verse Editions, 2022); The Avalanche Path in Summer (Ahsahta, 2019), a muscle-memory of a life in mountains; and Trafficke (Ahsahta, 2015), a mixed-form investigation of family, race, and language spanning from Reformation Scotland to the abolition of slavery in Maryland. She
has written extensively about war and its human consequences, including the volumes Gallowglass (Ahsahta, 2010), Bone Pagoda (Ahsahta, 2007), and A Smell of Burning Starts the Day (Wesleyan, 1988). Her first book, The Hands in Exile (Random House, 1983), was selected for the National Poetry Series. Her work has been published in the U.S., U.K., and Australia, and been recognized by numerous residencies and awards, including a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. Now Professor Emerita at George Mason University, she lives in Colorado. https://susantichy.com/
August 15, 2022
