ANCHORAGE, AK - Some of the biggest names in fiction, creative non-fiction and poetry will be in Anchorage in July to give a series of free public readings. The 3^rd Annual Northern Renaissance Arts and Science Series of public readings at UAA begins Sunday evening, July 11, with noted poet Kim Addonizio. Altogether, 18 writers from Alaska and Outside will read for nine evenings, through July 20.

The Northern Renaissance Arts and Science Series of public readings is part of the Master of Fine Arts graduate writing program of the UAA Department of Creative Writing and Literary Arts (CWLA). The three-year, low-residency MFA program includes a 12-day intensive summer residency at UAA, after which the student writers depart for their homes in Alaska and elsewhere to write and study under the guidance of individual writing mentors.

The public readings are scheduled for 8 to 9:30 p.m. each evening in Room 150 of the Fine Arts Building on the east side of the UAA campus. Doors will open at 7:30 p.m.  All readings are free and open to the public. UAA’s Campus Bookstore will be on-hand each evening to showcase and sell books authored by MFA faculty and special guest writers. For more information, contact Kathleen Tarr, MFA Program Coordinator at (907) 786-4394, or at afkt1@uaa.alaska.edu. The schedule of readings and the writers who’ll give them follow.

Sunday, July 11 – Kim Addonizio

Addonizio is the author of five poetry collections, most recently Lucifer at the Starlite, as well as two instructional books on writing poetry, two novels and a word/music CD with poet Susan Browne. She teaches private workshops in Oakland, CA, and online.

Monday, July 12 – Zack Rogow and  Linda McCarriston

Rogow is the author, editor or translator of 18 books or plays. His sixth book of poems, The Number Before Infinity, was published by Scarlet Tanager Books in 2008. He teaches in the MFA in Writing Program at the California College of the Arts and in the MFA program at UAA.

McCarriston is a senior core faculty member in UAA's MFA program. A winner of the Grolier Prize and the Consuelo Ford Prize from Poetry, she received the poetry fellowship at the Bunting Institute (now the Radcliffe Institute) at Harvard for 1992-1993. Her poetry books include: Little River New & Selected Poems; Eva-Mary and Talking Soft Dutch.

Tuesday, July 13 – Ed Allen and Judith Barrington

Allen is a new associate faculty member in UAA’s MFA program. He is the author of fiction, poetry, short story collections and workbooks. His novel, Mustang Sally, was made into the 2003 movie Easy Six (retitled in the Showtime DVD release as Easy Sex.)

Barrington is a memoirist, poet and teacher who was born in the U.K. and lives in Portland, OR. Her work has been published in many literary journals, and she gives memoir workshops in Europe and America. Her most recent book of poems is Horses and the Human Soul, which was selected by the Oregon State Library for “150 Books for the Sesquicentennial."

Wednesday, July 14 – Craig Childs and Carolyn Turgeon

Childs is a writer who focuses on the relationship between humans and the landscape, often told from mind-blowing journeys in the wilderness. He is a commentator for NPR's Morning Edition, and his work has appeared in The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Men's Journal, Outside and Orion. His new book, Finders Keepers, will arrive in August 2010.

Turgeon earned a Master's in Comparative Literature from UCLA then spent several years in New York working as a writer and editor. Her novels include: Rain Village and Godmother: The Secret Cinderella Story.  Her first children's novel, about the daughter of a swan maiden, will be published later in the summer of 2010. Turgeon’s third novel, Mermaid, will come out in March 2011,

Thursday, July 15 – Peggy Shumaker and Kate Gale

Shumaker is a widely published poet with work appearing in many literary journals and anthologies, nationally and internationally. Her newest collection of poems is Gnawed Bones. She has also published a lyrical memoir, Just Breathe Normally. She's currently working on a manuscript of poems set in Costa Rica. Shumaker lives in Fairbanks, Alaska, and teaches in the Rainier Writing Workshop. In 2008, she cofounded Boreal Books, an imprint of Red Hen Press, to publish literature and fine art from Alaska.

Gale is the 2005-2006 president of PEN USA, president of American Composers Forum/LA, cofounder and managing editor of Red Hen Press, editor at The Los Angeles Review, as well as a writer of poetry, novels and librettos.

Saturday, July 17 – Special dramatic event: Things I Didn’t Know I Loved
Note location change: Rasmuson Hall 101

There will be a theatrical reading of Things I Didn’t Know I Loved by Zack Rogow, directed by Dawson Moore, Coordinator of the Prince William Sound Community College Last Frontier Theatre Conference. A discussion will follow.

Rogow is the author, editor or translator of 18 books or plays. His sixth book of poems, The Number Before Infinity, was published by Scarlet Tanager Books in 2008. He teaches in the MFA in Writing Program at the California College of the Arts and in the MFA program at UAA.

Sunday, July 18 – Nancy Lord and Valerie Miner

Lord is Alaska’s current Writer Laureate, a long-time resident of Homer and winner of many honors and fellowships, the author of three short fiction collections (most recently The Man Who Swam with Beavers) and four books of literary nonfiction. She fished commercially for many years and has worked as a naturalist and historian on adventure cruise ships. She teaches part-time at the Kachemak Bay Branch of Kenai Peninsula College and at UAA.

Miner, an associate faculty member, is the award-winning author of 13 books. Her stories and essays are published in more than 60 anthologies. Her writings have been translated into eight languages. Valerie’s collaborative work includes books, museum exhibits as well as theatre. 

Monday, July 19 – Anne Caston and Rich Chiappone and Sherry Simpson

Caston's first book, Flying Out With The Wounded, won the 1996 New York University Press Prize in Poetry.  Her second collection, Judah's Lion, is now available in a second edition from Toad Hall Press (2009).  She is currently at work on a third collection of poems and is core faculty in the MFA program.

Chiappone lives in Anchor Point, Alaska where he teaches creative writing and serves on the faculty of the annual Kachemak Bay Writers’ Conference. He has been an associate faculty member in UAA’s MFA Program for the past three years.  He has won writing awards including an Alaska Press Club award and the John W. Voelker Award for short fiction. He has published dozens of stories and essays in both commercial and literary magazines. His newest book, Opening Days, has just been published by Barclay Press, Bolton, Massachusetts.

Simpson, a member of CWLA’s core faculty, is the author of two collections of essays, The Way Winter Comes and The Accidental Explorer: Wayfinding in Alaska, that explore how people use nature, wilderness, animals and cultural icons to define themselves and understand their world. Her nonfiction has appeared in anthologies and journals across the country. She is currently writing a book about people and bears.

Tuesday, July 20 – Jo-Ann Mapson and Derick Burleson and David Stevenson

Mapson, a member of CWLA’s core faculty, has written nine novels, most recently The Owl & Moon Café (Simon & Schuster). Her second, Blue Rodeo, was made into a TV movie starring Kris Kristofferson. Forthcoming in October 2010 from Bloomsbury USA is her new novel, Solomon’s Oak, which will be published in the UK in November 2010, as well as in audio and large print.

Burleson is the author of two books of poems: Never Night and Ejo: Poems, Rwanda 1991-94. A recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Poetry, Burleson teaches in the MFA program at both UAA and UAF and lives in Two Rivers.

Stevenson is the director of CWLA and the MFA Program at UAA. He writes often about the mountaineering experience both in fiction and nonfiction prose, and has recently contributed to Cold Flashes: Literary Snapshots of Alaska (University of Alaska Press), Alpinist and Cimarron Review.  His recently finished novel, Forty Crows, is set in Mexico City in the early 1970s.

More information about each of the writers, the CWLA low-residency program and the Northern Renaissance Arts and Science Series is available on the CWLA website, http://cwla.uaa.alaska.edu/.

For additional information, please contact Ann Marie Wawersik at (907) 786-4840 or anaw@uaa.alaska.edu.