February 23, 2004

Visiting Writers series bringing poets to campus

by K.C. Jaehnig

CARBONDALE, Ill. - Five poets will visit Southern Illinois University Carbondale in March and April to give free public readings of their work.

Adrian Blevins, author of "The Brass Girl Brouhaha," Patrick Donnelly, author of "The Charge," Joe Pineda, author of "Birthmark," Lee Ann Roripaugh, author of "Year of the Snake," and William Trowbridge, author of "The Complete Book of Kong," will come to campus as part of the Visiting Writers series sponsored jointly by SIUC's Department of English and its literary magazines, Grassroots and the Crab Orchard Review.

One of the things that stands out to me is that in every case, these are writers who had books come out within the last year," said Jon C. Tribble, managing editor of the review.

It's nice that we can bring in a group of writers who are very active in publishing right now."

It doesn't take special familiarity with poetry or these particular writers to be able to enjoy the readings, Tribble said.

The work communicates very clearly and is intended to engage a wide variety of readers," he said. "It really does reach out to people."

Expanding cultural outreach programs is among the goals of Southern@150, the blueprint for the development of the University by the time it celebrates its 150th anniversary in 2019.

Here's a quick look at the spring program schedule and the poets who will appear here.

Tuesday, March 2
8 p.m., William Trowbridge, Student Center Auditorium

Trowbridge, distinguished university professor at Northwest Missouri State, is associate editor of the literary journal The Laurel Review. Earlier books include "Flickers," "O Paradise" and "Enter Dark Stranger," and his poems have appeared in more than 20 anthologies and textbooks. Trowbridge has won, among other honors, an Academy of American Poets prize and fellowships from The MacDowell Colony and Yaddo.

Monday, March 29 
8 p.m., Adrian Blevins and Patrick Donnelly, Student Center Auditorium

Blevins teaches at Roanoke College in Virginia. She is also the author of "The Man Who Went Out for Cigarettes," an award-winning chapbook. In 2002, she won a Rona Jaffe Writers' Foundation award for poetry.

Donnelly, associate editor at Four Way Books, a not-for-profit literary press in New York City, also assists in setting up reading series for new and established writers at the Bowery and in Greenwich Village. His poems have appeared in such literary journals as The Yale Review and Ploughshares.

Thursday, April 1
8 p.m., Jon Pineda (reception and book signing to follow reading), Student Center Fourth Floor Video Lounge

Pineda, who lives in Norfolk, Va., won the 2003 Crab Orchard Series open competition, resulting in the publication of "Birthmark," his first book. His poetry has appeared in such publications as Many Mountains Moving and The Asian Pacific American Journal. He recently won a grant from the Virginia Commission for the Arts.

Thursday, April 8
8 p.m., Lee Ann Roripaugh (reception and book signing to follow reading), Student Center Fourth Floor Video Lounge

Roripaugh, an assistant professor of English at the University of South Dakota, also won the 2003 Crab Orchard Series open competition with "Year of the Snake." She is the author of an earlier poetry collection titled "Beyond Heart Mountain," a 1998 selection in the National Poetry Series. Her work also has appeared in such journals as Ploughshares and the North American Review. Previous honors include a 2003 artist fellowship from the Archibald Bush Foundation, the Randall Jarrell International Poetry Prize and the Academy of American Poets prize.