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Events

In collaboration with departments across campus, including English and the Sophie Kerr Committee, the Lit House hosts a robust reading series. Poets, essayists, fiction writers, playwrights, critics, editors, singer-songwriters, and studio artists routinely join us from around the world for readings, craft talks, and residencies. Recent guests include Chris Abani, Jericho Brown, Joy Castro, Natalie Diaz, Denise Duhamel, Carolyn Forché, Neil Gaiman, Terrance Hayes, Amy Hempel, Saeed Jones, Maggie Nelson, and Anthony Swofford.

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For in-person events, please consider the health and safety for our visiting writers as well as our 4-person staff (who are or care for immune-compromised people). While the campus policy stipulates that mask-wearing is optional, we ask that you please bring a mask with you to on-campus/in-person events. Thank you for your compassion!

For students needing to register attendance at Literary Events (for English credit) please visit this form. 

Fall 2024 Literary Events

Living Writers Poetry Series Presents: Cameron Awkward-Rich

Co-sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Committee

Headshot of Cameron Awkward-Rich
 

Tuesday, September 10, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House.
Cameron Awkward-Rich Reads From His Poetry
Book Sale and Signing to Follow.

Click here to stream.

Cameron Awkward-Rich is the author of two collections of poetry: Sympathetic Little Monster (Ricochet Editions, 2016) and Dispatch (Persea Books, 2019). His creative work has been supported by fellowships from Cave Canem, The Watering Hole, and the Lannan Foundation.

Also a scholar of trans theory and expressive culture in the U.S., Awkward-Rich earned his PhD from Stanford University's program in Modern Thought & Literature. His more critical writing can be found in Signs, Trans Studies Quarterly, American Quarterly, and elsewhere, and has been supported by fellowships from Duke University's program in Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and the ACLS. His book The Terrible We: Thinking with Trans Maladjustment was published by Duke University Press in Fall 2022. Presently, he is an associate professor of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

 


Welcome New Kohl Gallery Director and Curator


Headshot of Robert Blackson
 

Tuesday, September 17, 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House.
Come meet the new Director and Curator of the Kohl Gallery, Robert Blackson. A short Q&A with Professor Julie Wills precedes a reception.

Rob Blackson has extensive curatorial experience. He was Director of Exhibitions at Temple Contemporary at Temple University's Tyler School of Art since 2011. In 2012, Blackson became an Andy Warhol Curatorial Fellow. Previously serving as curator of public programs at Nottingham Contemporary, the UK's newest public contemporary art center, Blackson worked with numerous universities, artists, and writers to develop an eclectic and discursive program of lectures, screenings, performances, and live events. He also served as curator of BALTIC Center for Contemporary Art, Newcastle/Gateshead, UK, and the University of Sunderland's Reg Vardy Gallery. Blackson has contributed to a variety of catalogs and publications, including Art Journal, Cabinet, and Labyrinth, and he has lectured internationally on issues related to contemporary art practice.
 

Living Writers Poetry Series Presents: Carl Phillips

Co-sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Committee

Headshot of Carl Phillips
 

Tuesday, October 1, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House
God's Lioness: Carl Phillips on Sylvia Plath.

Click here to stream.

Wednesday, October 2, 7:00 PM ET
Hotchkiss Theater
Carl Phillips Reads From His Work.
Book Sale and Signing to Follow.

Click here to stream.

Carl Phillips is the author of 17 books of poetry, most recently Scattered Snows, to the North (2024) and Then the War: And Selected Poems 2007-2020, which won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize. His other honors include the 2021 Jackson Prize, the Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry, the Kingsley Tufts Award, a Lambda Literary Award, the PEN/USA Award for Poetry, and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Library of Congress, the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the Academy of American Poets.

 


Living Writers Poetry Series Presents: Diannely Antigua

Co-sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Committee

Headshot of Diannely Antigua

 

Wednesday, October 23, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House
So You Want to Make a Podcast? With Diannely Antigua.

Click here to stream.

Thursday, October 24, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House
Diannely Antigua Reading From Her Poetry

Click here to stream.

Diannely Antigua is a Dominican American poet and educator, born and raised in Massachusetts. She is the author of two poetry collections, Ugly Music (YesYes Books, 2019), and Good Monster (Copper Canyon Press, 2024). She is the recipient of a 2020 Whiting Award.

Antigua received her BA in English from the University of Massachusetts Lowell, and she received her MFA at NYU. She is the recipient of additional fellowships from CantoMundo, Community of Writers, Fine Arts Work Center Summer Program, and was a finalist for the 2021 Ruth Lily and Dorthy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowship. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and chosen for The Best of the Net Anthology. Her poems can be found in Poem-a-Day, Poetry, The American Poetry Review, Washington Square Review, The Adroit Journal, and elsewhere.


Kiplin Hall Student Reading and Information Session

Co-sponsored by the English Department, the Starr Center, and CES

 

Thursday, Nov 7, 5:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House
Kiplin Hall Student Reading and Informational

Please join us for a reading by the Washington College students who participated in the recent reboot of the Kiplin Hall summer study abroad program amidst the hills, dales, and moors of northern England! Program faculty and staff from the English Department and all three Centers will be on hand to discuss the upcoming trip in Summer 2025. Food and beverages will be served. Come one, come all!


Living Writers Poetry Series Presents: Rajiv Mohabir

Co-sponsored by both the Sophie Kerr Committee & the Center for Environment and Society

Headshot of Rajiv Mohabir
 

Wednesday, November 13, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House
Rajiv Mohabir Reads From His Poetry.

Click here to stream.

Thursday, November 14, 2:30 PM ET
Lawrence Wetlands Preserve
A Workshop Guided by Rajiv Mohabir.

Rajiv Mohabir is an Indo-Carribean American author of three acclaimed poetry collections, The Taxidermist's Cut, Cowherd's Son, Cutlishand Whale Aria; a book of translation, I even Regret Night, and his hybrid memoir, Antiman. He is winner of the 2015 Kundiman Prize, a 2015 PEN/Heim Translation Fund Grant, finalists for the 2017 and 2022 Lambda Literary Awards, finalist for the 2022 PEN Open Book Award, the 2021 National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry, and longlisted for the PEN/Voelcker Award in Poetry. Mohabir has received fellowships from Voices of Our Nation's Artist foundation, Kundiman, The Home School, and the American Institute of Indian Studies language program. He received his MFA in Poetry and Translation from Queens College, CUNY, and his PhD in English from the University of Hawai'i. Rajiv is currently a professor at the University of Colorado-Boulder.


What a Self Could Be: Poetry and Mental Health
A workshop and reading with
Diane Seuss

Sponsored by the Small Literary Arts Centers Coalition

Co-sponsored by Washington College's Center for Teaching & Learning


Headshot of Rajiv Mohabir
 

Monday, November 18, 6:00 PM ET
Zoom

Please click here to register for the virtual event.

Please Welcome Diane Seuss (Virtually) to Washington College.

Diane Seuss studied at Kalamazoo College and Western Michigan University, where she received a master's degree in social work.

Seuss is the author of six books of poetry: Modern Poetry (Graywolf Press, 2024); frank: sonnets (Graywolf Press, 2021), winner of the 2022 PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry, the 2021 Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the 2021 National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry, and the 2022 Pultizer Prize for Poetry; Still Life with Two Dead Peacocks and a Girl (Graywolf Press, 2018), a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in Poetry and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in Poetry; Four-Legged Girl (Graywolf Press, 2015), a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize; Wolf Lake, White Gown Blown Open (University of Massachusetts, 2010), a recipient of the Juniper Prize for Poetry; and It Blows You Hollow (New Issues Press, 1998).

SLACC is comprised of the Literary House at Washington College, the Boutelle-Day Poetry Center at Smith College, and the Stadler Center for the Literary Arts at Buknell University


 

Literary House Series Presents:

The Class of 2028 First Year Reading

FIRST-YEAR READING

First Year Reading Poster

Thursday, November 21, 5:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House.

Come hear original creative works by members of the class of 2028!

 

 

Spring 2025 Literary Events

Literary House Series Presents: A Fiction Reading and Generative Workshop by R. O. Kwon


Headshot of R.O. Kwon

 

Wednesday, January 29, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House
R.O. Kwon Reads from her Fiction.

Thursday, January 30, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House
A Generative Workshop with R. O. Kwon.

R.O. Kwon is the author of the nationally bestselling Exhibit, a New York Times Editors' Choice, which published in May 2024 with Riverhead (US) and will be out in July 2024 with Virago/Little Brown (UK). Kwon's bestselling first novel, The Incendiaries, has been translated into seven languages and was named a best book of the year by over forty publications. The Incendiaries was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Award. Kwon and Garth Greenwell co-edited Kink, a New York Times Notable Book aand recipient of the inaugural Joy Award.

Kwon’s writing has appeared in The New York Times, New Yorker, Time, Vanity Fair, Guardian, and elsewhere. She has received fellowships and awards from MacDowell, the National Endowment for the Arts, and Yaddo. Kwon was the 2024 Stein Visiting Writer at Stanford University. Born in Seoul, Kwon has lived most of her life in the United States.


Literary House Series Presents: A Reading and Generative Workshop by Christopher Tilghman


Headshot of Christopher Tilghman

 

Wednesday, February 26, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House
Christopher Tilghman Reads from his Fiction.

Thursday, February 27, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House
A Generative Workshop with Christopher Tilghman.

Christopher Tilghman was born and raised in Boston but his life has revolved around his family's farm in on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Three previous novels, Mason's Retreat,The Right-Hand Shore, and Thomas and Beal in the Midi tell the multigenerational story of a farm on the Eastern Shore called Mason's Retreat. His newest novel, On the Tobacco Coast, concludes the quartet in the present day. His other books include the novel Roads of the Heart, and the short story collections, The Way People Run and In a Father's Place.


Kent County Poetry Festival Presents: Denise Duhamel


Headshot of Denise Duhamel

 

Saturday, April 5, 7:00PM ET
Garfield Center for the Arts

Sunday, April 6, 2:00PM ET
Bob Ortiz Studios

A Weekend of Literary Festivities

Join us for the 16th annual Kent County Poetry Festival, keynoted by Denise Duhamel! Duhamel will be in conversation with Maureen Corrigan on Saturday evening. The Open Mic event will be held on Sunday. Both are free and open to the public! 

Events will be added, and more information will be available on the Kent Cultural Alliance's website: kentculture.org/poetryfest

The Poetry Festival is co-sponsored by the Kent Cultural Alliance, the Rose O'Neill Literary House, the BookPlate, and Robert Ortiz Studios.


Literary House Series Presents: Andrew Mozzina


Headshot of Diannely Antigua

 

Wednesday, April 9, 6:00PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Fiction Reading with Andrew Mozzina

Andrew Mozzina is the author of two novels, Tandem (Tortoise Books, 2023) and Contrary Motion (Spiegel & Grau, 2016), and two short story collections: Quality Snacks (Wayne State University Press, 2014), a finalist for the Flannery O'Connor Award, and The Women Were Leaving the Men (Wayne State University Press, 2007), which won the GLCA New Writers Award. His fiction has appeared in Tin House, Southern Review, Ecotone, The Missouri Review, and elsewhere. His stories have received special citations in Best American Short Stories, Pushcart Prize, and New Stories from the Midwest. He and his wife, Lorraine Alberts, live in Kalamazoo, where he teaches literature and creative writing at Kalamazoo College.


Literary House Series Presents:

A Literary House Senior Reading!

Senior Reading Poster

 

Wednesday, April 23, 5:00PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

SENIOR READING

Come join the Class of 2025 as they are invited to read from their original works. In addition, the writing prizes will be announced, so celebrate your peers as the winners of the Genre Prize, Pfister Poetry Prize, and Warner Prize are congratulated.

 


Past Events

Literary House Presents: 2nd Annual Alumni Zoom Reading

Lit House Mug


Tuesday, January 16, 7:00 PM ET

Register here.

Calling all Washington College alumni writers! We'll gather on Zoom to share creative work (published or unpublished) in our 2nd annual Alumni Reading Extravaganza from 7-9 pm ET on January 16, 2024. 

Note: WC has an educational account with Zoom and is thus exempt from the AI data-gathering that Zoom has announced.


Sophie Kerr Week Presents:

Special events to celebrate the publishing career of Sophie Kerr.

Photo of Sophie Kerr with her cat Thomas Hardy
 

Monday, February 5, 7:00 PM ET
Virtual.

WHAT MAKES GREAT WRITERS! A talk with Dr. Elizabeth O'Connor, Associate Professor, English Department

Tuesday, February 6, 6:00 PM ET
The Egg.

A Book Talk with Natalie Martiniatis.

Wednesday, February 7, 7:00 PM ET
Virtual.

Elizabeth Chandler, Screenwriter of the SISTERHOOD OF THE TRAVELING PANTS talks about her career.

Thursday, February 8, 5:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House.

Cara Koontz '15 Career Talk

Friday, February 9, 12:30 PM ET

Trivia Contest Gift Card Drawing!

 


Literary House & Sophie Kerr Screenwriting Series Present: Eugene Garcia-Cross

Headshot of Eugene Garcia-Cross

Monday, February 19, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Selling a Network Series: A Q&A with Eugene Garcia-Cross.

Tuesday, February 20, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Fiction Reading by Eugene Garcia-Cross.

Eugene Garcia-Cross is the author of the short story collection Fires of Our Choosing and the novel Miss Me Forever. Since transitioning to TV, he has written for the Disney Channel, NBC, Peacock, and Disney+. In 2022, Eugene sold his multicam family comedy pilow, Forgive and Forget, to ABC, with Ty Burrell's production company, Desert Whale, attached to executive produce.

 

Literary House & Sophie Kerr Screenwriting Series Presents: Joey Siara

Headshot of Joey Siara

Tuesday, March 5, 4:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

The Writer's Room of Streaming: Joey Siara Talks About Writers' Rooms in the Age of Streaming.

Wednesday, March 6, 6:00 PM ET

"Secrets of Great Scripts": Explore Scenes and Script Excerpts with Joey Siara!

Joey Siara spent his twenties performing in a noisy indie-rock band that played over five-hundred shows, including sets at Lollapalooza and Coachella. He has worked on series (The Resort, Emergence, Parenthood) for PBS, Discovery, and CNN. Currently, he is a writing instructor in the School of Theater, Film, and Television at UCLA. His short-story, "The Last of the Goggled Barskys," was featured on Slate.

 

Literary House Series Presents: A Poetry Reading by Michael Dumanis

Headshot of Michael Dumanis

Wednesday, March 27, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Poetry Reading with Michael Dumanis.

Michael Dumanis is the author of the poetry collections Creature (Four Way Books, 2023) and My Soviet Union (University of Massachusetts Press, 2007), winner of the Juniper Prize for Poetry. Born in Moscow, in the former Soviet Union, Dumanis emigrated at the age of five to New York. Dumanis teaches at Bennington, where he serves as Director of Poetry at Bennington and Editor of Bennington Review.

 


Literary House Series and the Kent County Poetry Festival Present: Naomi Shihab Nye

Headshot of Naomi Shihab Nye

April 5-6, 2024

Friday, April 5, 4:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Poetry Workshop with Naomi Shihab Nye.

Naomi Shihab Nye is a Palestinian American poet, author of more than 30 books, and a Lannan Fellow, a Guggenheim Fellow, and a Witter Bynner Fellow. Her work has been presented on A Prairie Home Companion and The Writer's Almanac. She is Chancellor Emeritus for the Academy of American Poets and the 2019-2021 Young People's Poet Laureate. She was awarded a Lifetime Achievement by the National Book Critics Circle and is Professor of Poetry at Texas State University.

 


Class of 2024 Senior Reading

2024 Senior Reading

 
When: Tuesday, April 23th, 6:00 PM
Rose O'Neill Literary House
 

Join us as we celebrate and hear graduating senior writers read from their original work. 

Literary House & Sophie Kerr Screenwriters Series Presents:

Two events with screenwriter and producer Amy Güth.

Headshot of Amy Guth
 

Tuesday, September 5, 2:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House.

ADAPT!: Writer Amy Güth leds a craft talk on taking literature from the page to the big screen.

Wednesday, September 6, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House.

PRODUCE!: Producer Amy Güth reveals the secrets behind the least-understood job in Hollywood.

Amy Güth is an award-winning screenwriter ("Open Road," "A Thousand Cuts," "The Mender," among others) and producer, having most recently produced "Elvis of the Yukon" and "La Mitad Del Mundo," a Spanish-language documentary about sex trafficking in Ecuador, playing now in film festivals. In addition to her novel, Three Fallen Women (2016), Güth's fiction, journalism, and commentary have appeared widely. Güth was Executive Director of the Midwest Independent Film Festival, publisher of Tribune Publishing Company's RedEye, and founder of Pilcrow Lit Fest in Chicago. She has served as President of the Board of Directors at Bitch Media as well as President of the Association for Women Journalists.

 


Literary House & Sophie Kerr Screenwriters Series Presents:

A screening and craft talk with John Whitney Stillman.

Headshot of Whit Stillman
 

Monday, September 18, 7:00 PM ET
Norman James Theater

Screening of Love and Friendship followed by a talkback/Q&A with screenwriter Whit Stillman.

Tuesday, September 19, 4:00 PM ET

A Craft Talk on Screenwriting with Whit Stillman.

John Whitney Stillman is a writer, director, and actor known for his 1990 film Metropolitan, which earned him a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. He is also known for his other films, Barcelona (1994), The Last Days of Disco (1998), Damsels in Distress (2011), as well as his most recent film, Love & Friendship, released in 2016.

 


Literary House & Sophie Kerr Screenwriters Series Presents:

Two events with TV writer Jonterri Gadson.

co-sponsored with Black Studies.


Headshot of Jonterri Gadson

 

Tuesday, October 3, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Screening of TV episodes and clips followed by Q&A with TV writer Jonterri Gadson.

Wednesday, October 4, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Comedy Writing Workshop with Jonterri Gadson.

Jonterri Gadson is a former creative writing professor who chose TV over tenure. Her most recent credits include Everybody Still Hates Chris and Netflix's The Upshaws. She received an Emmy noination for her work on HBO's A Black Lady Sketch Show. She won Kevin Hart's LOL Film Fellowship for a short she wrote/directed and premiered at the American Black Film Festival. Her pilot script won Best Comedy Script at the New York Television Festival where she won development deals with OneX and Topic Studios. She's an alum of the NBC Late Night Writers Workshop, New York Stage & Filmmakers Lab, Refinery29 & TBS Riot Comedy Writers Lab and the IFP Project Forum. Her full-length poetry collection is Blues Triumphant (YesYes Books). 

 


Literary House Series Presents:

A reading with James Allen Hall.

Headshot of James Allen Hall
 

Wednesday, October 18, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A reading from Romantic Comedy with James Allen Hall.

James Allen Hall is the author most recently of Romantic Comedy. Their other books are Now You're the Enemy (poems) and I Liked You Better Before I Knew You So Well (lyric personal essays). They are the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment of the Arts, the Maryland State Arts Council, the Lambda Literary Foundation, the Texas Institute of Letters, the Fellowship of Southern Writers, Bread Loaf, Sewanee, and the University of Arizona Poetry Center. They direct the Rose O'Neill Literary House at Washington College, where they serve as Associate Professor of English and Editor of Cherry Tree, a national literary magazine.

 


Literary House & Sophie Kerr Screenwriters Series Presents:

Secrets from the Extrapolations Writers' Room: A screening and talkback with Ron Currie, Jr.

Headshot of Ron Currie Jr.
 

Thursday, November 9, 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Screening and Talkback with Novelist and Screenwriter Ron Currie, Jr.

Ron Currie, Jr. is the author of four very well-received novels, and his short fiction and nonfiction have been reprinted in Best American Essays and Best American Nonrequired Reading anthologies. As a screenwriter he worked most recently on the Apple TV+ series Extrapolations and has developed projects with AMC Studios, Amblin Television, and ITV America.

 


Literary House Series in Collaboration with SLACC Presents

A Reading and Generative Workshop with Alexis Pauline Gumbs

co-sponsored by the Boutelle-Day Poetry Center at Smith College and the Stadler Center for the Literary Arts at Bucknell University.

Headshot of Alexis Pauline Gumbs


Monday, November 13, 6:30 PM ET
Virtual Public Event

Register here.

This reading and workshop is especially for students and alumni of the SLACC member institutions. You'll see a Smith College Zoom registration page, and you'll receive registration confirmation from Smith College staff. 

Note: Our educational Zoom license disallows all data collection that Zoom has recently announced it will do.

Alexis Pauline Gumbs is the author most recently of Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals (2020). Gumbs' poetry and fiction have been included in Best American Experimental Writing and she is currently Creative Writing Editor at Feminist Studies and in residence as a National Humanities Center Fellow, where she is working on The Eternal Life of Audre Lorde: Biography as Ceremony (forthcoming, FSG). 

 

Literary House Series Presents:

The Class of 2027 First Year Reading

First Year Reading Poster

 

 

FIRST-YEAR READING

Tuesday, November 28, 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House.

Come hear original creative works by members of the class of 2027!

Literary House Series Presents:

Alumni Extravaganza Reading

lit house mug
 

Wednesday, January 25, 2023 8:00 PM ET
Virtual

Celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Rose O’Neill Literary House.


Literary House Series Presents:

First-Year Reading

Lit House Exterior
 

Wednesday, November 30, 2022 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Come hear Washington College first-year writers read from their original work!


Literary House Series Presents:

Two Events with Manuel Muñoz.

Munoz
 

Monday, November 14, 2022 12:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Lunch and workshop with Manuel Muñoz

Come have lunch with us and enjoy a workshop designed to help you think about story in a different way and to generate new work.

Monday, November 14, 2022 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Manuel Muñoz

Manuel Muñoz reads from his new book of stories, The Consequences, just published by Graywolf Press. A Q&A and author signing will follow.

Manuel Muñoz is the author of a novel, What You See in the Dark, and the short-story collections Zigzagger and The Faith Healer of Olive Avenue, which was shortlisted for the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award. He is the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York Foundation for the Arts. He has been recognized with a Whiting Writer’s Award, three O. Henry Awards, and an appearance in Best American Short Stories. A native of Dinuba, California, and a first-generation college student, Manuel graduated from Harvard University and received his MFA in creative writing at Cornell University. He currently lives and works in Tucson, Arizona.


Literary House Series Presents:

A reading and generative workshop with Professor Joe Osmundson.

Joseph Osmundson
 

Monday, October 3, 2022 6:00 PM ET
Virtual

Giving a brief reading from his creative work, Prof. Osmundson will then lead a generative workshop that mixes science and creative writing.

Joseph Osmundson is a poet, essayist, and molecular biophysicist based in New York City. His most recent book, Virology (W.W. Norton, 2022) is a series of essays exploring the power of viruses to shape not only our health, but our social, political, and economic systems. He is also the author of two previous books of poems: Inside/Out and Capsid. His research has been supported by the American Cancer Society, and it has also been published in leading biological journals such as Cell and PNAS. Osmundson is currently a clinical assistant professor of Biology at NYU.


Literary House Series Presents:

Bob Day Celebration

Robert Day
 

Tuesday, September 13, 2022 8:00 PM ET
Virtual

The first event of our 50th year celebrates our founding director, Bob Day. Please come and either hear about Prof. Day, share a favorite memory of him, or share a short passage or poem.


Literary House Series Presents:

A Senior Reading
Lit House Exterior with Lilacs

Monday, April 25, 2022 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Come hear graduating senior writers read from their original pieces. The Literary House will also announce the winners of the Literary House Genre Fiction Prize, the William W. Warner Prize for Creative Writing on Nature and the Environment, and the Jude & Miriam Pfister Poetry Prize.


Literary House Series Presents:

Two Events with Sigrid Nunez

Sigrid Nunez
 

Wednesday, April 13, 2021 5:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Sigrid Nunez Reads from Her Fiction

Thursday, April 14, 2021 5:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Sigrid Nunez Leads a Generative Fiction Workshop

Sigrid Nunez has published eight novels, including A Feather on the Breath of God, The Last of Her Kind, Salvation City, The Friend, and, most recently, What Are You Going Through. She is also the author of Sempre Susan: A Memoir of Susan Sontag. The Friend, a New York Times bestseller, won the 2018 National Book Award and was a finalist for the 2019 Simpson/Joyce Carol Oates Prize. In France, it was longlisted for the 2019 Prix Femina and named a finalist for the 2019 Prix du Meilleure Livre. It was also a finalist for the 2020 International Dublin Literary Award. Nunez’s other honors and awards include a Whiting Writer’s Award, a Berlin Prize Fellowship, the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award, the Rome Prize in Literature, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. This year she was inducted as a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Among the journals to which she has contributed are The New York Times, The New York Times Book Review, The Wall Street Journal, The Paris Review, The New York Review of Books, Threepenny Review, Harper’s, McSweeney’s, Tin House, The Believer and newyorker.com. Her work has also appeared in several anthologies, including four Pushcart Prize volumes and four anthologies of Asian-American literature. One of her short stories was selected for The Best American Short Stories 2019. Her work has been translated into more than twenty-five languages.


SLACC Series Presents:

Claudia Rankine and Garrett Bradley

Claudia Rankine
 

Tuesday, March 1, 2021 6:00 PM ET
Virtual

Claudia Rankine in Conversation with Garrett Bradley

Rankine and Bradley share their work briefly before entering into a moderated discussion. This is a collaboration between the Rose O'Neill Literary House at Washington College, the Stadler Center at Bucknell University, and the Boutelle-Day Poetry Center at Smith College. 


Literary House Series Presents:

A First-Year Reading

Lit House Exterior
 

Monday, November 29, 2021 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

The Annual First-Year Reading

Come hear Washington College first-year writers read from their original work!


Literary House and CES Presents:

Two Events with Robert Macfarlane

Robert Macfarlane
 

Tuesday, November 3, 2021 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading by Robert Macfarlane

Wednesday, November 4, 2020 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Generative Workshop with Robert Macfarlane

Robert Macfarlane is the author of Mountains of the Mind, The Wild Places, The Old Ways, Landmarks, and The Lost Words, co-created with Jackie Morris. Mountains of the Mind won the Guardian First Book Award and the Somerset Maugham Award and The Wild Places won the Boardman-Tasker Award. Both books have been adapted for television by the BBC. The Lost Words won the Books Are My Bag Beautiful Book Award and the Hay Festival Book of the Year. He is a Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and writes on environmentalism, literature and travel for publications including the Guardian, the Sunday Times and The New York Times.


Literary House Series Presents:

An Evening with Katherine Larson
Larson
 

Thursday, September 23, 2021 5:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

The Science of Poetry/The Poetry of Science

At its heart, writing and science share the same common goal: discovery and meaning. How can writing creatively benefit from the methodologies and insights that science can bring? How can scientific knowledge be enhanced by the art of language? This workshop is designed for intellectually curious people--those who identify as scientists and those that identify as writers, though those things do not need to overlap.


Literary House Series Presents:

A Senior Reading
Lit House Exterior with Lilacs

Wednesday, April 28, 2021 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Come hear graduating senior writers read from their original pieces. The Literary House will also announce the winners of the Literary House Genre Fiction Prize, the William W. Warner Prize for Creative Writing on Nature and the Environment, and the Jude & Miriam Pfister Poetry Prize.


Literary House Series and the Kent County Poetry Festival Present:

Richard Blanco and Maureen Corrigan
Headshot of Blanco

Saturday, April 24, 2021
Kent County Poetry Festival

Selected by President Obama as the fifth inaugural poet in U.S. history, Richard Blanco is the youngest and the first Latino, immigrant, and gay person to serve in such a role. Born in Madrid to Cuban exile parents and raised in Miami, the negotiation of cultural identity characterizes his four collections of poetry: How To Love a Country, City of a Hundred Fires, which received the Agnes Starrett Poetry Prize from the University of Pittsburgh Press; Directions to The Beach of the Dead, recipient of the Beyond Margins Award from the PEN American Center; and Looking for The Gulf Motel, recipient of the Paterson Poetry Prize and the Thom Gunn Award. He has also authored the memoirs For All of Us, One Today: An Inaugural Poet’s Journey and The Prince of Los Cocuyos: A Miami Childhood, winner of a Lambda Literary Award. His inaugural poem “One Today” was published as a children’s book, in collaboration with renowned illustrator Dav Pilkey. Boundaries, a collaboration with photographer Jacob Hessler, challenges the physical and psychological dividing lines that shadow the United States. And his latest book of poems, How to Love a Country, both interrogates the American narrative, past and present, and celebrates the still unkept promise of its ideals. Blanco has written occasional poems for the re-opening of the U.S. Embassy in Cuba, Freedom to Marry, the Tech Awards of Silicon Valley, and the Boston Strong benefit concert following the Boston Marathon bombings. He is a Woodrow Wilson Fellow and has received numerous honorary doctorates. He has taught at Georgetown University, American University, and Wesleyan University. He serves as the first Education Ambassador for The Academy of American Poets.

Maureen Corrigan, book critic for NPR's Fresh Air, is The Nicky and Jamie Grant Distinguished Professor of the Practice in Literary Criticism at Georgetown University. She is an associate editor of and contributor to Mystery and Suspense Writers (Scribner) and the winner of the 1999 Edgar Award for Criticism, presented by the Mystery Writers of America. Corrigan served as a juror for the 2012 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction. Her book So We Read On: How The Great Gatsby Came To Be and Why It Endures was published by Little, Brown in September 2014. Corrigan's literary memoir, Leave Me Alone, I'm Reading! was published in 2005. Corrigan is also a reviewer and columnist for The Washington Post's Book World. In addition to serving on the advisory panel of The American Heritage Dictionary, she has chaired the Mystery and Suspense judges' panel of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and is currently a curator at the American Writers Museum in Chicago.


Writers as Editors Series Presents:

A Night with Rick Barot

Rick Barot
 

Tuesday, April 20, 2021 5:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading and Discussion of New England Review

Wednesday, April 21, 2021 5:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Generative Poetry Workshop

Rick Barot was born in the Philippines, grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, and attended Wesleyan University and The Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa. He has published three books of poetry with Sarabande Books: The Darker Fall (2002), which received the Kathryn A. Morton Prize; Want (2008), which was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award and won the 2009 Grub Street Book Prize; and Chord (2015), which was a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize and received the 2016 UNT Rilke Prize, the PEN Open Book Award, and the Publishing Triangle’s Thom Gunn Award.  He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Artist Trust of Washington, the Civitella Ranieri Foundation, and Stanford University, where he was a Wallace E. Stegner Fellow and a Jones Lecturer in Poetry. In 2020, Barot received the Shelley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America. His poems and essays have appeared in numerous publications, including Poetry, The Paris Review, The New Republic, Ploughshares, Tin House, The Kenyon Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, The New Yorker, and The Threepenny Review. His work has been included in many anthologies, including Legitimate Dangers: American Poets of the New CenturyAsian-American Poetry: The Next GenerationLanguage for a New Century, and The Best American Poetry 2012, 2016, and 2020. Barot is the poetry editor of New England Review. He lives in Tacoma, Washington and teaches at Pacific Lutheran University. He is also the director of The Rainier Writing Workshop, the low-residency MFA in Creative Writing at PLU. His fourth book of poems, The Galleons, was published by Milkweed Editions in February 2020.


Literary House Series Presents:

The 2020 Mary Wood Fellowship

Kathryn Nuernberger
 

Tuesday, March 9, 2021 5:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Kathryn Nuernberger

Wednesday, March 10, 2021 5:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Writing as Ritual Act: A Craft Talk

Kathryn Nuernberger’s third poetry collection, Rue, was published in 2020 (BOA). The End of Pink (BOA, 2016), which won the 2015 James Laughlin prize from the Academy of American Poets, and Rag & Bone (Elixir, 2011), which won the 2010 Antivenom Prize. A collection of lyric essays, Brief Interviews with the Romantic Past (Ohio State University Press, 2017), won the Non/Fiction Prize from The Journal. She teaches in the MFA Program at University of Minnesota. She has received grants from the NEA, American Antiquarian Society and the Bakken Museum of Electricity in Life.


Writers as Editors Series Presents:

Lily Hoang

Lily Hoang
 

Thursday, February 4, 2021 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Lily Hoang

Lily Hoang is the author of five books of prose, including Changing (recipient of a PEN Open Books Award) and A Bestiary (winner of the Cleveland State University Poetry Center’s Non-Fiction Book Prize). With Joshua Marie Wilkinson, she edited the anthology The Force of What’s Possible: Writers on Accessibility and the Avant-Garde. In Summer 2017, she was Mellon Scholar in Residence at Rhodes University in South Africa. She is Editor of Jaded Ibis Press and Executive Editor of HTML Giant. 


Literary House Series Presents:

A Sophie Kerr Prize Informational

Two students looking at camera
 

Monday, January 27, 2021 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

So You Want to Submit a Sophie Kerr Prize Portfolio?: An Informational Session

Led by Professors James Allen Hall and Sean Meehan, this brief informational session is designed for graduating seniors who are preparing to submit Sophie Kerr Prize portfolios in spring 2021. The session will cover the guidelines for submitting a portfolio and offer helpful advice about constructing a portfolio that highlights each writer’s strengths.  


Literary House Series Presents:

A First-Year Reading

Lit House Exterior
 

Monday, November 23, 2020 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

The Annual First-Year Reading

Come hear Washington College first-year writers read from their original work!


Living Writers Series Presents:

A Night with Hanif Abdurraqib

Hanif Abdurraqib
 

Tuesday, November 17, 2020 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Poetry and Nonfiction Reading by Hanif Abdurraqib

Hanif Abdurraqib is a poet, essayist, and cultural critic from Columbus, Ohio. His poetry has been published in Muzzle, Vinyl, PEN American, and various other journals. His essays and music criticism have been published in The FADER, Pitchfork, The New Yorker, and The New York Times. His first full length poetry collection, The Crown Ain’t Worth Much, was released in June 2016 from Button Poetry. It was named a finalist for the Eric Hoffer Book Prize, and was nominated for a Hurston-Wright Legacy Award. With Big Lucks, he released a limited edition chapbook, Vintage Sadness, in summer 2017 (you cannot get it anymore and he is very sorry.) His first collection of essays, They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us, was released in winter 2017 by Two Dollar Radio and was named a book of the year by Buzzfeed, Esquire, NPR, Oprah Magazine, Paste, CBC, The Los Angeles Review, Pitchfork, and The Chicago Tribune, among others. He released Go Ahead In The Rain: Notes To A Tribe Called Quest with University of Texas press in February 2019. The book became a New York Times Bestseller, and was met with critical acclaim. His second collection of poems, A Fortune For Your Disaster, was released in 2019 by Tin House. He is a graduate of Beechcroft High School.


Sophie Kerr Series Presents:

A Conversation with Robert Mooney, Philip Brady, and Tim Seibles

Tim Seibles
 

Tuesday, November 3, 2020 5:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

The Writer's Life and Beyond

This will not be a traditional reading. Instead, this will be a moderated conversation, in honor of Bob’s retirement, about how writers build relationships with their publishers and vice versa, what it means to be a literary publisher in the 21st century, etc.


Sophie Kerr Series Presents:

A Lecture by Dr. Scott Newstok

Dr. Scott Newstok
 

Monday, October 19, 2020 5:00 PM ET
Hynson Lounge

How to Think Like Shakespeare

A graduate of Grinnell College and Harvard University, Scott Newstok teaches literature of the English Renaissance as well as film, rhetoric, education, lyric poetry, and the humanities at Rhodes College in Memphis, TN, where he is also the Founding Director of the Pearce Shakespeare Endowment. He has published books on Kenneth Burke’s Shakespeare criticism, early modern English epitaphs, a collection of essays on Macbeth and race (co-edited with Ayanna Thompson), and most recently, How to Think Like Shakespeare: Lessons from a Renaissance Education (Princeton University Press, 2020) which distills vital habits of mind that can help you think more deeply, write more effectively, and learn more joyfully, in school or beyond. Sarah Bakewell, author of How to Live: Or a Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer, praises "Scott Newstok’s book, a playful delight, also delivers a serious pedagogical punch."


Living Writers Series Presents:

A Night with Melissa Febos

Melissa Febos
 

Thursday, October 8, 2020 6:00 PM ET
Virtual

A Nonfiction Reading with Melissa Febos

Melissa Febos is the author of the critically acclaimed memoir, Whip Smart (St. Martin’s Press 2010) and the essay collection, Abandon Me (Bloomsbury 2017), which The New Yorker called “mesmerizing,” and was a LAMBDA Literary Award finalist, a Triangle Publishing Award finalist, an Indie Next Pick, and named a Best Book of 2017 by Esquire, Book Riot, The Cut, Electric Literature, The Brooklyn Rail, Bustle, Refinery29, Salon, The Rumpus, and others. Her second essay collection will be published by Bloomsbury in 2020. Her work has been widely anthologized and appears in publications including The Believer, Tin House, Sewanee Review, Granta, The Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, Glamour, Guernica, Post Road, Salon, The New York Times, Elle, The Guardian, Vogue, Dissent, The New York Time Book Review, The Chronicle of Higher Education Review, Bitch Magazine, Poets & Writers, The Rumpus, and Goodbye to All That: Writers on Loving and Leaving New York. She is currently an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Monmouth University, where she directs the MFA program. 


Sophie Kerr Series Presents:

Casey Cep and Elaine Weiss

Casey Cep
 

Thursday, October 1, 2020 6:00 PM ET
Hynson Lounge

A Conversation with Casey Cep and Elaine Weiss

Casey Cep is a writer from the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, and The New Republic, among many other publications. Her first book is Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud, and the Last Trial of Harper Lee (Knopf, 2019). A proud graduate of the Talbot County Public Schools, she has an A.B. from Harvard College and an M.Phil. from the University of Oxford, where she studied as a Rhodes Scholar.

Elaine Weiss is a Baltimore-based journalist and author, whose feature writing has been recognized with prizes from the Society of Professional Journalists, and her byline has appeared in many national publications. Her long-form writing garnered a Pushcart Prize “Editor’s Choice” award, and she is a proud MacDowell Colony Fellow. Weiss’ most recent book, The Woman's Hour: The Great Fight to Win the Vote has won critical acclaim from the New York Times, Wall St. Journal, Christian Science Monitor, and The New Yorker, hailed as a “riveting, nail-biting political thriller” with powerful parallels to today's political environment. The Woman’s Hour was a GoodReads Readers' Choice Award winner, short-listed for the 2019 Chautauqua Prize, and received the American Bar Association's highest honor, the 2019 Silver Gavel Award. Steven Speilberg’s Amblin production company is adapting the book for TV, with Hillary Rodham Clinton serving as Executive Producer.


Living Writers Series Presents:

Two Events with Sarah Manguso

Sarah Manguso
 

Tuesday, September 8, 2020 6:00 PM ET
Virtual

A Nonfiction Reading with Sarah Manguso

Wednesday, September 9, 2020 6:00 PM ET
Virtual

A Workshop with Sarah Manguso

Born and raised near Boston, writer Sarah Manguso earned her BA at Harvard University and an MFA at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Her books include the poetry collections Siste Viator (2006) and The Captain Lands in Paradise (2002); the story collection Hard to Admit and Harder to Escape (2007); the memoir The Two Kinds of Decay (2008), selected as an Editors’ Choice by the New York Times Sunday Book Review; and the hybrid-genre book The Guardians: An Elegy for a Friend (2012). Her work has been featured in several volumes of The Best American Poetry.


Literary House Series Presents:

Fall Movie Night

Persepolis
 

Friday, September 4, 2020 6:00 PM ET
Virtual

A Film Screening of Persepolis

Based on the autobiographical graphic novel of the same name, Persepolis was directed by Marjane Satrapi in collaboration with Vincent Paronnaud and follows the coming of age story of a young girl against the backdrop of the Iranian Revolution.


Literary House Series Presents:

Senior Reading

Lit House Exterior
 

Tuesday, April 21, 2020 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Come hear graduating senior writers read from their original pieces. The Literary House will also announce the winners of the Literary House Genre Fiction Prize, the William W. Warner Prize for Creative Writing on Nature and the Environment, and the Jude & Miriam Pfister Poetry Prize.


Literary House Series Presents:

Two events with Kathryn Nuernberger, 2020 Mary Wood Fellow

Kathryn Nuernberger
 

Thursday, April 14, 2020 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading by the 2020 Mary Wood Fellow

Friday, April 15, 2020 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Craft Talk by the 2020 Mary Wood Fellow

Kathryn Nuernberger’s third poetry collection, Rue, is forthcoming in Spring 2020 (BOA).  The End of Pink (BOA, 2016), which won the 2015 James Laughlin prize from the Academy of American Poets, and Rag & Bone (Elixir, 2011), which won the 2010 Antivenom Prize. A collection of lyric essays, Brief Interviews with the Romantic Past (Ohio State University Press, 2017), won the Non/Fiction Prize from The Journal. She teaches in the MFA Program at University of Minnesota. She has received grants from the NEA,  American Antiquarian Society and the Bakken Museum of Electricity in Life.


Writers as Editors Series Presents:

Paul Hendrickson and Jonathan Segal

Lit House Exterior
 

Thursday, April 2, 2020 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Jonathan Segal in conversation with Paul Hendrickson

Jonathan Segal is a 1966 graduate of Washington College, where he majored in English and took courses in creative writing. He is now Vice President and Senior Editor at Alfred A. Knopf in New York City. He has edited seven Pulitzer Prize-winning books, and his authors include Paul Hendrickson, Arthur Ashe, Elie Wiesel, and Tony Blair, among others.

Paul Hendrickson teaches writing workshops in advanced nonfiction as Senior Lecture at the University of Pennsylvania, where he received a Provost's teaching award in 2005. He worked for over 30 years in daily journalism, including as a staff feature writer at the Washington Post. He is the author of 7 books, including the forthcoming Plagued by Fire: The Dreams and Furies of Frank Lloyd Wright. His book, Hemingway's Boat, was published by Knopf in 2011 and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and won The Chicago Tribune's annual Heartland Prize. His previous book, Sons of Mississippi (also from Knopf) won the National Book Critics Circle Award as well as the Heartland Prize. He has also been a finalist for the National Book Award, and has held fellowships from the Guggenheim and the NEA. He has degrees in English from St. Louis University and Penn State.


Literary House Series Presents:

Casey Cep

Casey Cep
 

Tuesday, March 17, 2020 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Nonfiction Reading by Casey Cep

Casey Cep reads from her debut work of creative nonfiction, Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud, and the Last Trial of Harper Lee.

Casey Cep is a writer from the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, and The New Republic, among many other publications. Her first book is Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud, and the Last Trial of Harper Lee (Knopf, 2019). A proud graduate of the Talbot County Public Schools, she has an A.B. from Harvard College and an M.Phil. from the University of Oxford, where she studied as a Rhodes Scholar.


Writers as Editors Series Presents:

Aimee Nezhukumatathil

Aimee
 

Tuesday, February 25, 2020 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Poetry Reading with Aimee Nezhukumatathil

Aimee Nezhukumatathil will read from her poetry as part of the Editors as Writers Series, co-sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Committee and the Rose O'Neill Literary House.


Writers as Editors Series Presents:

Kate Bernheimer

Bernheimer
 

Thursday, February 6, 2020 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Fiction Reading with Kate Bernheimer

Kate Bernheimer will read from her fiction as part of the Editors as Writers Series, co-sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Committee and the Rose O'Neill Literary House.


Literary House Series Presents:

A Sophie Kerr Prize Informational

Two students looking at camera
 

Monday, January 27, 2020 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

So You Want to Submit a Sophie Kerr Prize Portfolio?: An Informational Session

Led by Professors James Allen Hall and Sean Meehan, this brief informational session is designed for graduating seniors who are preparing to submit Sophie Kerr Prize portfolios in spring 2020. The session will cover the guidelines for submitting a portfolio and offer helpful advice about constructing a portfolio that highlights each writer’s strengths.  


Literary House Series Presents:

Monica Ferrell

Ferrell
 

Monday, January 27, 2020 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Poetry Reading and Q&A With Monica Ferrell.

Monica Ferrell will read from her poetry, and take audience questions afterwards.  A book signing will follow.

Monica Ferrell is the author of three books of fiction and poetry, most recently the collection You Darling Thing (Four Way, 2018). Her novel The Answer Is Always Yes (Dial Press/Random House) was named one of Booklist's Top Ten Debut Novels of the Year. Her first collection of poems, Beasts for the Chase, was a finalist for the Asian American Writers Workshop Prize in Poetry and won the Sarabande Books Kathryn A. Morton Prize. She has been recognized with residencies at the Civitella Ranieri Foundation and the MacDowell Colony, a Wallace Stegner Fellowship, and a Discovery/The Nation Prize. She has taught fiction and poetry for the MFA Program at Columbia University, and is Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Purchase College (SUNY). She was born in New Delhi, India, and lives with her husband and children in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn.


Literary House Series Presents:

First-Year Reading

Lit House Exterior
 

Tuesday, November 19, 2019 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Come hear Washington College first-year writers read from their original work!


Literary House Series Presents:

Two Events with Sophie Kerr Writer-in-Residence, Jason Fagone

Jason Fagone
 

Tuesday, November 5, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Jason Fagone

Wednesday, November 6, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

The Dark Art of Finding Ideas and Frustrating Your Rivals: A Craft Talk

Jason Fagone is a journalist at the San Francisco Chronicle who has also covered technology, sports, and culture for the Huffington Post and other places. Fagone is the author of three books, the most recent of which is The Woman Who Smashed Codes: A True Story of Love, Spies, and the Unlikely Heroine Who Outwitted America's Enemies (Dey Street Books, 2017). The Woman Who Smashed Codes tells the story of Elizabeth Smith Friedman, who solved the secret messages of Nazi Spies during WWII. His other books include Ingenious (Crown, 2013), which follows a small group of entrepreneurial inverntors who set out to build a practical car that travels 100 miles on the energy in a single gallon of gas, and Horsemen of the Esophagus (Crown, 2006), about competitive eating. Fagone's nonfiction has appeared in The Atlantic, The New Yorker, Mother Jones, The New York Times Magazine, Wired, GQ, Esquire, and elsewhere. In 2014-15, he was the Knight-Wallace Fellow in journalism at the University of Michigan. He lives in San Francisco with his wife and daughter.


Literary House Series Presents:

R. Eric Thompson Residency

R. Eric Thompson
 

Thursday, October 17, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Eric Reads the News: Humor in Current Events 


Literary House Series Presents:

Tea & Talk with Dr. Alisha Knight

Alisha Knight
 

Thursday, September 26, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Agents Wanted: Selling Racial Uplift at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

Dr. Alisha Knight will discuss her current research on the Colored Co-operative Publishing Company and their efforts to use book publishing and distribution networks to empower African Americans at the turn of the century.


Literary House Series Presents:

Rebecca Makkai

Rebecca Makkai
 

Thursday, September 5, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Fiction Reading and Q&A with Rebecca Makkai.

Rebecca Makkai reads from her novel, The Great Believers, which was a finalist for the National Book Award. Afterwards, she will take audience questions and a book signing will follow. 

Rebecca Makkai is the Chicago-based author of the novels The Great Believers, The Hundred-Year House, and The Borrower, as well as the short story collection Music for Wartime. Her short fiction won a 2017 Pushcart Prize, and was chosen for The Best American Short Stories for four consecutive years (2008-2011). The recipient of a 2014 NEA fellowship, Makkai is on the MFA faculties of Sierra Nevada College and Northwestern University, and she is the Artistic Director of StoryStudio Chicago.


Literary House Series Presents:

Fall Movie Night

Fences
 

Friday, August 30, 2019 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Screening of Fences

Fences is adapted from the Pulitzer Prize-winning play by August Wilson and follows Troy Maxson (played by Denzel Washington) and his family, which includes his wife (played by Viola Davis, in an Oscar-winning role) and sons. The Boston Globe writes that the film comprises "two titanic performances and an immeasurable American drama." Fences is set in 1950s Pittsburgh and confronts issues of racism, family, mental illness, and redemption. 


Literary House Series Presents:

Senior Reading

Fences
 

Tuesday, April 23, 2019 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Come hear graduating senior writers read from their original pieces. The Literary House will also announce the winners of the Literary House Genre Fiction Prize, the William W. Warner Prize for Creative Writing on Nature and the Environment, and the Jude & Miriam Pfister Poetry Prize.


Literary House Series Presents:

Gene Demby

Gene Demby
 

Wednesday, April 17, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Talk by Gene Demby

Gene Demby is the lead blogger for National Public Radio's Code Switch team where he covers issues on race, ethnicity, and culture. He is also cohost of the weekly Code Switch podcast. Before coming to NPR, he served as the managing editor for Huffington Post's Black Voices following its launch. He later covered politics. Prior to that role he spent six years in various positions at The New York Times. While working for the Times in 2007, he started a blog about race, culture, politics and media called PostBourgie, which won the 2009 Black Weblog Award for Best News/Politics Site.


Living Writers Series Presents:

Visiting Writer Rion Amilcar Scott

Rion Amilcar Scott
 

Thursday, April 11, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Fiction Reading with Rion Amilcar Scott

Rion Amilcar Scott will read from his fiction as part of the Living Writers Series, co-sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Committee and the Rose O'Neill Literary House.


Living Writers Series Presents:

Visiting Writer Lidia Yuknavitch

Lidia Yuknavitch
 

Tuesday, March 19, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Fiction Reading with Lidia Yuknavitch

Lidia Yuknavitch will read from her fiction as part of the Living Writers Series, co-sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Committee and the Rose O'Neill Literary House.


Living Writers Series Presents:

Visiting Writer Edward P. Jones

Edward P Jones
 

Thursday, February 28, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Fiction Reading with Edward P. Jones

Edward P. Jones will read from his fiction as part of the Living Writers Series, co-sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Committee and the Rose O'Neill Literary House.


Literary House Series Presents:

Tea & Talk with Andy Oros

Andy Oros
 

Monday, February 11, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Tea & Talk with Andy Oros


Living Writers Series Presents:

Visiting Writer Lucy Corin

Lucy Corin
 

Tuesday, February 5, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Fiction Reading with Lucy Corin

Lucy Corin will read from her fiction as part of the Living Writers Series, co-sponsored by the Sophie Kerr Committee and the Rose O'Neill Literary House.


Literary House Series Presents:

A Sophie Kerr Prize Informational

Two students looking at the camera
 

Tuesday, January 29, 2019 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

So You Want to Submit a Sophie Kerr Prize Portfolio?: An Informational Session

Led by Professors James Allen Hall and Kate Moncrief, this brief informational session is designed for graduating seniors who are preparing to submit Sophie Kerr Prize portfolios in spring 2019. The session will cover the guidelines for submitting a portfolio and offer helpful advice about constructing a portfolio that highlights each writer’s strengths.  


Literary House Series Presents:

Fall Movie Night

Bright Star
 

Friday, December 7, 2018 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Screening of Bright Star

This 2009 film directed by Jane Campion focuses on the last three year of the poet John Keats's life, and his romantic relationship with Fanny Brawne.  The film includes many of Keats's poems, including "La Belle Dame sans Merci," and "Ode to a Nightingale," as well as the sonnet which inspires the title.


Literary House Series Presents:

First-Year Reading

Lit House Exterior
 

Wednesday, November 28, 2018 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Annual First-Year Reading

Come hear Washington College first-year writers read from their original work!


Literary House Series Presents:

Erika L. Sánchez

Erika L. Sánchez
 

Monday, November 12, 2018 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Poetry Reading and Q&A with Erika L. Sánchez

Erika L. Sánchez is the daughter of Mexican immigrants, and is a poet, novelist, and essayist living in Chicago. She is the author of a collection of poems, Lessons on Expulsion (Graywolf, 2017) as well as the young adult novel, I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter (Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2017), which was a New York Times Bestseller and a National Book Awards finalist. Sánchez graduated Phi Beta Kappa and Magna Cum Laude from the University of Illinois at Chicago, then went onto Madrid, Spain on a Fulbright Scholarship. She received an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of New Mexico. Since graduate school, Sánchez has received a CantoMundo Fellowship, Bread Loaf Scholarship, the 2013 “Discovery”/Boston Review Prize, and a 2015 Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowship from The Poetry Foundation.  She was recently named a 2017-2019 Princeton Arts Fellow. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in many prestigious literary journals, including Pleiades, Copper Nickel, Vinyl Poetry, Guernica, Boston Review, ESPN.com, the Paris Review, Gulf Coast, and POETRY Magazine. Her poetry has also been featured on “Latino USA” on NPR and published in Please Excuse This Poem: 100 New Poems for the Next Generation (Viking, 2015).


Literary House Series Presents:

An Alumni Journalism Panel

Journalism wordsearch
 

Friday, November 2, 2018 4:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Truth in an Age of Alternative Facts

How is rhetoric used in journalism, politics, and public relations in this day and age?  Panelists from each of those fields will illuminate how rhetoric or "spin" has shaped American culture in the last two years, with some discussion of relaying information and facts in a "Post-Truth" society.


Literary House Series Presents:

Fall Movie Night

Interview with the Vampire screenshot
 

Friday, October 26, 2018 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Screening of Interview with the Vampire

Based on the Anne Rice novel of the same name and directed by Neil Jordan, Interview with the Vampire stars Tom Cruise as the vampire Lestat, who tells his un-life story to a San Francisco reporter.  The film received Academy Award nominations for Best Art Direction and Best Original Score, and Kirsten Dunst, in one of her first movie roles ever, received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actress.


Literary House Series Presents:

A Talk with Mya Gosling

Mya Gosling
 

Wednesday, October 3, 2018 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

That's the Humor of It: Good Tickle Brain and the Silly Side of Shakespeare

Mya Gosling will present this talk of her webcomic series as it intersects Shakespeare studies.


Sophie Kerr Series Presents:

A Talk by David Wallace

David Wallace
 

Wednesday, September 12, 2018 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Horrible History, Terrible Tale: Chaucer and Jephthah’s Daughter

David Wallace has been Judith Rodin Professor of English, University of Pennsylvania, since 1996.  He is a Fellow of the English Association and currently President of the Medieval Academy of America.  He is the author or editor of ten books, including Chaucerian Polity (Stanford, 1999), The Cambridge History of Medieval English Literature (Cambridge, 2002), Strong Women (Oxford, 2011), and Geoffrey Chaucer: A New Introduction (Oxford, 2017).  In 2016, Oxford University Press published Europe: A Literary History 1348-1418, a revolutionary literary history conceived of and edited by David Wallace that breaks with older nationalist models. Rome-centered, Latinate cultures emphasized by earlier literary histories are here supplemented by Greek and Byzantine, Armenian and Slavic, Arabic and Hebrew writings across a wide range of locales.  His primary commitments are to Europe and European literatures, to the performance and enjoyment of poetry (especially Chaucer), and to helping secure a viable future for younger scholars.


Literary House Series Presents:

A Talk & Tea with Kimberly Andrews and Lindsay Lusby

Lindsay Lusby
 

Wednesday, September 5, 2018 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Kimberley Andrews and Lindsay Lusby


Literary House Series Presents:

Fall Movie Night

Moonlight
 

Friday, August 21, 2018 6:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Screening of Moonlight

Based on the play In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue and directed by Barry Jenkins, this lyrical film follows its hero, Chiron, from childhood to adulthood and takes a piercing look at masculinity, race, sexuality, and coming of age in America.  Moonlight won Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (Mahershala Ali, in a powerhouse performance), and Best Adapted Screenplay.


Literary House Series Presents:

Senior Reading

Fences
 

Thursday, April 17, 2018 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Come hear graduating senior writers read from their original pieces. The Literary House will also announce the winners of the Literary House Genre Fiction Prize, the William W. Warner Prize for Creative Writing on Nature and the Environment, and the Jude & Miriam Pfister Poetry Prize.


Literary House Series Presents:

Two Events with the Mary Wood Fellow 

Amber Dermont
 

Tuesday, April 10, 2018 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Craft Talk with Amber Dermont

Wednesday, April 11, 2018 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Amber Dermont

Amber Dermont is the author of the novel, The Starboard Sea (St. Martin's Press, 2012), and the short story collection, Damage Control (St. Martin's, 2013).  A graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop, Dermont received her PhD in literature and creative writing from the University of Houston. Her short fiction has appeared in TriQuarterly, Tin House, Zoetrope: All-Story, and in the anthologies Best New American Voices, Best American Nonrequired Reading, The Worst Years of Your Life, and Home of the Brave. A recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment of the Arts, InPrint, the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, and the Sewanee Writers' Conference, she is currently an associate professor of English and creative writing at Rice University in Houston, Texas.  She is at work on another novel called The Laughing Girl.


Literary House Series Presents:

Amy Hempel

Amy Hempel
 

Tuesday, March 27, 2018 5:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Amy Hempel

Amy Hempel will read from her work as part of the Literary House Series sponsored by the Rose O'Neill Literary House.


Sophie Kerr Lecture Series Presents:

Phil Sicker

Phil Sicker
 

Wednesday, March 21, 2018 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Phil Sicker

Philip Sicker is a Professor of English at Fordham University in Bronx, NY. He is the author of Love and the Quest for Identity in the Fiction of Henry James (Princeton, 1980), and numerous articles on Joyce, Mann, Eliot, Lawrence, Nabokov, novel theory, and film. He is the co-editor of Joyce Studies Annual. His forthcoming book, Ulysses, Visual Technologies, and Culture, will be published by Cambridge University Press in 2018.


Literary House Series Presents:

Visiting Writer Natalie Diaz

Natalie Diaz
 

Thursday, February 1, 2018 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Poetry Reading with Natalie Diaz

Natalie Diaz was born and raised in the Fort Mojave Indian Village in Needles, California, on the banks of the Colorado River. She is Mojave and an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian Tribe. Her first poetry collection, When My Brother Was an Aztec, was published by Copper Canyon Press in 2012. Diaz’s work has also appeared  in Narrative Magazine, Gwarlingo, The Rumpus, and Ploughshares. Her poetry has has garnered the Nimrod/Hardman Pablo Neruda Prize for Poetry, the Louis Untermeyer Scholarship in Poetry from Bread Loaf, the Narrative Poetry Prize, the Holmes National Poetry Prize from Princeton University, a US Artists Ford Fellowship, a Native Arts Council Foundation Artist Fellowship, and a Lannan Literary Fellowship. Her poems, folding Spanish and Mojave into American English, yield an urgent and important new voice to the cannon of contemporary Native American poetry, finding a place among the work of Leslie Marmon Silko and Joy Harjo.


Literary House Series Presents:

A Sophie Kerr Prize Informational

Two students looking at the camera.
 

Tuesday, January 30, 2018 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

So You Want to Submit a Sophie Kerr Prize Portfolio?: An Informational Session

Led by Professor James Allen Hall, this brief informational session is designed for graduating seniors who are preparing to submit Sophie Kerr Prize portfolios in spring 2018. The session will cover the guidelines for submitting a portfolio and offer helpful advice about constructing a portfolio that highlights each writer’s strengths.  

 

Literary House Series Presents:

First-Year Reading

Lit House Exterior
 

Tuesday, November 28, 2017 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Annual First-Year Reading

Come hear Washington College first-year writers read from their original work!


Literary House Series Presents:

A Reading with Terrance Hayes

Terrance Hayes
 

Monday, November 1, 2017 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Celebration of Gwendolyn Brooks

One of the most compelling voices in American poetry, Terrance Hayes is the author of five books of poetry; How to Be Drawn (2015), longlisted for the 2015 National Book Award in Poetry; Lighthead (2010), winner of the 2010 National Book Award in Poetry; Wind in a Box, winner of a Pushcart Prize; Hip Logic, winner of the National Poetry Series, a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Award, and runner-up for the James Laughlin Award from the Academy of American Poets; and Muscular Music, winner of both the Whiting Writers Award and the Kate Tufts Discovery Award. He has been a recipient of many other honors and awards, including a 2014 MacArthur Foundation Genius Award, two Pushcart selections, eight Best American Poetry selections, and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship and the Guggenheim Foundation. His poems have appeared in literary journals and magazines including The New Yorker, Poetry, The American Poetry Review, Ploughshares, Fence, The Kenyon Review, Jubilat, Harvard Review, and Poetry. His poetry has also been featured on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.


Literary House Series Presents:

A Book Launch with Lia Purpura

Scream book cover
 

Thursday, October 19, 2017 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Scream: A Literary House Press Book Launch with Lia Purpura

Join us for a creative nonfiction reading and book signing as the Literary House Press releases a special, limited-edition letterpress chapbook, Scream (or never minding), by Lia Purpura, including original illustrations by local artist Stuart Cawley.


Sophie Kerr Lecture Series Presents:

James Allen Hall

James Allen Hall
 

Monday, October 9, 2017 5:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Creative Nonfiction Reading by James Allen Hall

James Allen Hall is an associate professor of English at Washington College, where he also serves as Director of the Rose O'Neill Literary House.  In April 2017, he published I Liked You Better Before I Knew You So Well, a book of lyric personal essays which won Cleveland State University Poetry Center's Essay Collection Award, judged by Chris Kraus.  Also a poet, Hall is the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York Foundation of the Arts, the University of Arizona Poetry Center, and others.  His work has appeared in Best American Poetry as well as in leading national literary venues.


Sophie Kerr Lecture Series Presents:

Two Events with Craig Steven Wilder

Craig Steven Wilder
 

Thursday, September 28, 2017 4:30 PM ET
Hynson Lounge

A Reading with Craig Steven Wilder

Friday, September 29, 2017 10:00 AM ET
CAC Common Room

A Presentation with Craig Steven Wilder

Craig Steven Wilder is a historian of American institutions and ideas. His most recent book is Ebony & Ivy: Race, Slavery, and the Troubled History of America’s Universities (Bloomsbury, 2013), which Kirkus Reviews named one of the best nonfiction books of the year and which won multiple book awards. It inspired the Grammy Award-winning artist Esperanza Spalding’s song, “Ebony and Ivy” in Emily’s D+Evolution (Concord Records, 2016). A book titled Ebony & Ivy was featured in the film Dear White People (Code Red Films, 2014). He is also the author of A Covenant with Color: Race and Social Power in Brooklyn (Columbia University Press, 2001) and In the Company of Black Men: The African Influence on African American Culture in New York City (New York University Press, 2001). Professor Wilder began his career as a community organizer in the South Bronx. He is a senior fellow at the Bard Prison Initiative, where he has served as a visiting professor, a commencement speaker, and an academic advisor. He has taught at Dartmouth College, Williams College, and Long Island University, and he has been a visiting professor at the New School University and University College London. He is currently the Barton L. Weller Professor of History at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 


Sophie Kerr Lecture Series Presents:

Dr. Lauret Savoy

Lauret Savoy
 

Thursday, September 21, 2017 4:30 PM ET
Decker Theater

First Year Book Reading with Dr. Lauret Savoy, from Trace

Dr. Lauret Savoy is a professor of environmental studies and geology at Mount Holyoke College. Trace (Counterpoint Press) won the 2016 American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation.  Trace was also a finalist for the PEN American Open Book Award and the Phillis Wheatley Book Award, as well as shortlisted for the William Saroyan International Prize for Writing.


Sophie Kerr Lecture Series Presents:

Maureen Corrigan

Maureen Corrigan
 

Wednesday, September 6, 2017 5:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Maureen Corrigan

Maureen Corrigan, book critic for NPR's Fresh Air, is The Nicky and Jamie Grant Distinguished Professor of the Practice in Literary Criticism at Georgetown University. She is an associate editor of and contributor to Mystery and Suspense Writers (Scribner) and the winner of the 1999 Edgar Award for Criticism, presented by the Mystery Writers of America. Corrigan served as a juror for the 2012 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction. Her book So We Read On: How The Great Gatsby Came To Be and Why It Endures was published by Little, Brown in September 2014. Corrigan's literary memoir, Leave Me Alone, I'm Reading! was published in 2005. Corrigan is also a reviewer and columnist for The Washington Post's Book World. In addition to serving on the advisory panel of The American Heritage Dictionary, she has chaired the Mystery and Suspense judges' panel of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and is currently a curator at the American Writers Museum in Chicago.


Literary House Series Presents:

Spring Movie Nights

Movie Poster of Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy
 

Thursday, May 4, 2017 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A film screening of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Directed by Garth Jennings, and created by Douglas Adams, this film stars Martin Freeman, Sam Rockwell, Mos Def, Zooey Deschanel, and the voices of Stephen Fry and Alan Rickman.


Literary House Series Presents:

Senior Reading

Lit House Exterior
 

Thursday, April 20, 2017 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Come hear graduating senior writers read from their original pieces. The Literary House will also announce the winners of the Literary House Genre Fiction Prize, the William W. Warner Prize for Creative Writing on Nature and the Environment, and the Jude & Miriam Pfister Poetry Prize.


Literary House Series Presents:

Spring Movie Nights

Screenshot of Carol
 

Wednesday, April 19, 2017 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Film Screening of Carol

The screenplay for this film, written by Phyllis Nagy, is based on the 1952 romance novel The Price of Salt (also known as Carol) by Patricia Highsmith. The film stars Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara, Sarah Paulson, Jake Lacy, and Kyle Chandler.


The Personal & The Political Presents:

An Evening with Chris Abani

Photo of Chris Abani
 

Thursday, April 6, 2017 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Public Reading with Chris Abani

Chris Abani's books of fiction include The Secret History of Las Vegas (Pengiun, 2014), Song for Night (Akashic Books, 2007), The Virgin of Flames (Pengiun, 2007), Becoming Abigail (Akashic Books, 2006), GraceLand (FSG, 2004/Picador, 2005), and Masters of the Board (Delta 1985). His poetry collections are Sanctificum (Copper Canyon Press, 2006), There Are No Names For Red (Red Hen Press, 2010), Feed Me the Sun: Collected Long Poems (Peepal Tree Press Ltd, 2010), Hands Washing Water (Copper Canyon Press, 2006), Dog Woman (Red Hen Press, 2004), Daphne's Lot (Red Hen Press, 2003), and Kalakuta Republic (Saqi, 2001). He is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, the PEN/Hemingway Award, the PEN Beyond the Margins Award, the Hurston Wright Award, and a Lannan Literary Fellowship, among many honors. His work has been translated into French, Italian, Spanish, German, Swedish, Romanian, Hebrew, Macedonian, Ukrianian, Portuguese, Dutch, Bosnian, and Serbian.


The Personal & The Political Presents:

An Evening with Carolyn Forché.

Carolyn Forche
 

Thursday, March 30, 2017 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Carolyn Forché

Carolyn Forché's first volume, Gathering the Tribes (Yale University Press, 1975), winner of the Yale Series of Younger Poets Prize, was followed by The Country Between Us (Harper & Row, 1981), The Angel of History (HarperCollins, 1994), and Blue Hour (HarperCollins, 2003). She has translated Mahmoud Darwish, Claribel Alegria, and Robert Desnos. Her famed international anthology, Against Forgetting (W.W. Norton, 1983), has been praised by Nelson Mandela as "itself a blow against tyranny, against prejudice, against injustice," and is followed by the 2014 anthology The Poetry of Witness (W.W. Norton). In 1988 in Stockholm, she received the Edita and Ira Morris Hiroshima Foundation for Peace and Culture Award for her human rights advcacy and the preservation of memory and culture. She is currently at work on a memoir.


The Political & The Personal Series Presents:

Christine J. Wade

Photo of Christine J. Wade
 

Thursday, February 24, 2017 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Faculty Tea & Talk with Christine J. Wade

Christine J. Wade is Associate Professor of Political Science and International Studies and the Curator of the Louis L. Goldstein Program in Public Affairs at Washington College in Chestertown, Maryland, where she teaches classes on Latin American politics, comparative peace processes, human rights, US-Latin American Relations, and the politics of development. She is an expert in the politics of Central America, and has conducted field research in El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua. She is the author of Captured Peace: Elites and Peacebuilding in El Salvador (Ohio University Press, January 2016), and co-author of Nicaragua: Emerging from the Shadow of the Eagle (Westview Press, 2016), Understanding Central America: Global Forces, Rebellion and Change (Westview Press, 2014), and A Revolução Salvadorenha (The Salvadoran Revolution) (Fundação Editora Da UNESP, 2006). She is the co-author and co-editor of Latin American Politics and Development, which will appear in its 9th edition in July 2017. She is also the author of other scholarly works dealing with revolutions and post-war violence and peacebuilding. Her current events commentaries regularly appear in World Politics Review, the Latin American Advisor, and other venues. 


The Personal & The Political Series Presents:

An Evening with Brian Turner

Photo of Brian Turner
 

Tuesday, February 21, 2017 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Brian Turner

Brian Turner is a poet and memoirist who served seen years in the US Army. He is the author of two poetry collections, Phantom Noise (Alice James, 2010), and Here, Bullet (Alice James, 2005), which won the 2005 Beatrice Hawley Award, the New York Times "Editor's Choice" selection, the 2006 PEN Center USA "Best in the West" award, the 2007 Poets Prize, and others. Turner's work has been published in National Geographic, The New York Times, Poetry Daily, Harper's Magazine, and other fine journals. Turner has been awarded a United States Artists Fellowship, an NEA Fellowship, a Lannan Foundation Fellowship, and more. His recent memoir, My Life as a Foreign Country (W.W. Norton & Co., 2015), has been called, "achingly, disturbingly, shockingly beautiful." 


Literary House Series Presents:

Spring Movie Nights

To Kill a Mockingbird screenshot
 

Friday, February 17, 2017 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A film screening of To Kill a Mockingbird

Directed by Robert Mulligan, this three-time Academy Award-winning film stars Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch and Mary Badham as Scout. The screenplay by Horton Foote is based on Harper Lee's 1960 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same name.


Literary House Series Presents:

A Sophie Kerr Prize Informational

Two students sitting in chairs looking at camera.
 

Tuesday, January 31, 2020 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

So You Want to Submit a Sophie Kerr Prize Portfolio?: An Informational Session

Led by Professor James Allen Hall, this brief informational session is designed for graduating seniors who are preparing to submit Sophie Kerr Prize portfolios in spring 2017. The session will cover the guidelines for submitting a portfolio and offer helpful advice about constructing a portfolio that highlights each writer’s strengths.  


Literary House Series Presents:

First Year Reading

Ferrell
 

Tuesday, November 29, 2016 7:00 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Annual First-Year Reading

Come hear Washington College first-year writers read from their original work!


Living Writers Series Presents:

Timothy Donnelly

Photo of Timothy Donnelly
 

Tuesday, November 15, 2016 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Timothy Donnelly

Timothy Donnelly is the author of Twenty-seven Props for a Production of Eine Lebenszeit (Grove 2003) and The Cloud Corportation (Wave, 2010/Picador, 2012), winner of the 2012 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. His chapbook Hymn to Life was oublished by Factory Hollow Press in 2014 and with John Ashbery and Geoffrey G. O'Brien he is the co-author of Three Poets. He is the recipient of The Paris Review's Bernard F. Conners Prize, a Pushcart Prize, and the Poetry Society of America's Alice Fay Di Castagnola Award as well as fellowships from the New York State Writers Institute and the Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. He is currently chair of the Writing Program at Columbia University's School of the Arts and poetry editory of Boston Review. He lives in Brooklyn with his family.


Living Writers Series Presents:

An Evening with Cathy Linh Che

Photo of Cathy Linh Che
 

Thursday, October 27, 2016 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Cathy Linh Che

Cathy Linh Che is a Vietnamese American writer and multidisciplinary artist from Los Angeles who lives and works in New York City.


Literary House Series Presents:

Find Your Subject & Voice

Photo of Laura Oliver
 

Friday, October 21, 2016 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Workshop for Writers of Fiction & Memoir with Laura Oliver '75

Using published examples, writing exercises, expert instruction, and lively discussion, this dyanamic workshop will help you find the story you wish to tell and the most authentic authorial voice in which to tell it.


Literary House Series Presents:

A Literary House Press Book Launch

Book Cover of Still Life with Poem
 

Tuesday, October 18, 2016 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

Still Life with Poem: A Literary House Press Book Launch

Come join the Rose O'Neill Literary House to celebrate the book launch of Still Life with Poem, edited by Jehanne Dubrow and Lindsay Lusby. The night will feature poetry readings by James Arthur, James Allen Hall, Leslie Harrison, Dawn Lonsinger, Lindsay Lusby, Dora Malech, and Jason Schneiderman.


Living Writers Series Presents:

An Evening with Denise Duhamel

Photo of Denise Duhamel
 

Thursday, October 6, 2016 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Denise Duhamel

Denise Duhamel’s most recent book of poetry Blowout (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2013) was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Her other titles include Ka-Ching! (Pittsburgh, 2009); Two and Two (Pittsburgh, 2005); Queen for a Day: Selected and New Poems (Pittsburgh, 2001); The Star-Spangled Banner (Southern Illinois University Press, 1999); and Kinky (Orhisis, 1997) .  She and Maureen Seaton co-authored CAPRICE (Collaborations: Collected, Uncollected, and New) (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2015). Duhamel is a recipient of fellowships from the Guggenhiem Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts.  She is a professor at Florida International University in Miami.


Living Writers Series Presents:

An Evening with Jericho Brown

Photo of Jericho Brown
 

Thursday, September 29, 2016 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Jericho Brown

Jericho Brown is author of Please (New Issues 2008), which won the American Book Award. His second book, The New Testament (Copper Canyon 2014), won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award.  He is the director of the Creative Writing Program and a professor at Emory University.


Literary House Series Presents:

The First-Year Book Reading

Photo of Idra Novey
 

Wednesday, September 7, 2016 4:30 PM ET
Rose O'Neill Literary House

A Reading with Idra Novey

Idra Novey is the author of Ways to Disappear (Little, Brown 2016), a New York Times Editors' Choice and Staff Pick at The Paris Review. Her poetry collections include Exit, Civilian (University of Georgia Press, 2012), selected for the National Poetry Series, The Next Country (Alice James, 2008), winner of the Kinereth Gensler Award, and Clarice: The Visitor (Sylph Editions, 2015), a collaboration with the artist Erica Baum. Her fiction and poetry have been translated into eight languages and she’s written for The New York Times, NPR’s All Things Considered, Slate, and The Paris Review. She is the recipient of awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, Poets & Writers Magazine, the PEN Translation Fund, the Poetry Foundation, and the Poetry Society of America. She’s also translated the work of several prominent Brazilian writers, most recently Clarice Lispector’s novel The Passion According to G.H. She’s taught at Princeton University, Columbia, NYU, Fordham, the Catholic University of Chile, and in the Bard Prison Initiative. 


Qualtrics sign-in form link for events for CRW/JEP minors.