Thursday, August 30, 2012

Former Other Words participant named NC's Poet Laureate

Award winning poet, professor and advocate for literacy, Joseph Bathanti, of Vilas, has been named North Carolina’s Poet Laureate by Governor Bev Perdue.

North Carolina’s seventh poet laureate, Bathanti will be installed during a public celebration scheduled Thursday, Sept. 20 at 4:30 p.m. at the State Capitol. The event is free. He succeeds Cathy Smith Bowers, the state's poet laureate from 2010 to June 30, 2012.

Bathanti is a professor of creative writing at Appalachian State University where he is also Director of Writing in the Field and Writer-in-Residence in the University's Watauga Global Community. He has taught writing workshops in prisons for more than three decades and is former chair of the N.C. Writers’ Network Prison project.

“I can’t imagine a better place in the United States to be a writer than North Carolina,” Bathanti says. “There is no place richer in literature and no place that has celebrated writers in quite the same way as our state does.”

Bathanti’s books of poetry include This Metal (St. Andrews College Press, 1996 and Press 53, 2012), Restoring Sacred Art (Star Cloud Press, 2010), Land of Amnesia (Press 53, 2009), Anson County (Williams & Simpson, 1989 and Parkway Publishers, 2005), The Feast of All Saints (Nightshade press, 1994) and Communion Partners (Briarpatch Press, 1986). He has published two novels, Coventry (Novello Festival Press, 2006) and East Liberty (Banks Channel Books, 2001) along with a book of short stories, The High Heart (Eastern Washington University Press, 2007).

A native of Pittsburgh, Penn., Bathanti arrived in North Carolina in 1976 as a member of Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA), a national service program designed to fight poverty, and he never left the state. Assigned to work in Huntersville Prison in Mecklenburg County, he met fellow volunteer and future wife, Joan Carey on his first day of training. They have been married for 35 years.

Bathanti is a two-time recipient of Literature Fellowships from the N.C. Arts Council (1994 and 2009) and will receive the 2012 Ragan-Rubin Award, made to an outstanding North Carolina writer, from the N.C. English Teachers Association (NCETA). He has received numerous other awards including the 2002 Linda Flowers Prize, awarded annually by the North Carolina Humanities Council; 2006 Novello Literary Award; 2002 Sherwood Anderson Award; 2006 Spokane Prize for Short Fiction, to name a few. His fiction, nonfiction and poetry have appeared in numerous journals including Carolina Quarterly, Texas Review, California Quarterly, Cincinnati Poetry Review, Connecticut Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, Shenandoah, and New Letters.

Bathanti will be installed as N.C. Poet Laureate in a ceremony at the North Carolina State Capitol, One Edenton Street in downtown Raleigh, Thursday, Sept. 20 at 4:30 p.m. The free event is open to the public.

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

2012 Conference Sunday Advanced Workshops

2012 Conference Sunday Advanced Workshops
Optional Advanced Writing Workshops
The new Advanced Breakthrough Workshops being offered for the first time can be taken without full conference registration. Those rates are: Sunday Advanced Breakthrough Workshops Only: $100 for members, $125 nonmembers; Member Students, $55 Sunday only; Nonmember Students $70 Sunday only.  Register here: http://floridarts.org/other-words-conference/2012-conference-registration/
Mark Powell
Fiction
Sunday, Nov. 11th



"Getting it on the page" This workshop will focus on the process of moving from an initial idea to a solid (if not final) draft. We will examine a number of passages by published writers.

Mark Powell is the author of the novels Prodigals, Blood Kin, and The Dark Corner. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Breadloaf Writers' Conference. He teaches fiction writing at Stetson University.

Ira Sukrungruang
Non Fiction
Sunday, Nov. 11th


In this workshop session writers will explore the nature and balance of scene and exposition in their nonfiction and investigate other structures besides chonology. Though scene is used in fiction, how one approaches scene and dialogue is different when dealing with real life events. Students will write and share their work with the workshop group. 

Ira Sukrungruang is author of the memoir Talk Thai: The Adventures of Buddhist Boy and the co-editor of What Are You Looking At? The First Fat Fiction Anthology and Scoot Over, Skinny: The Fat Nonfiction Anthology. He has published his essays, poems, and short stories in many literary journals and anthologies, including Creative Nonfiction, The Bellingham Review, North American Review, Isotope, Crab Orchard Review, Post Road, and Tilting the Continent: Southeast Asian American Writing. He is the editor of Sweet: A Literary Confection (sweetlit.com), and teaches in the MFA program at University of South Florida. For more information about him, please visit: www.sukrungruang.com.

Terri Witek
Poetry
Sunday, Nov. 11th


Topic: “Site-Specific St Augustine.” After an introductory exercise, Sunday poets will become flaneurs and flaneuses, wandering the city with a series of prompts designed to generate new work. Intervals inside and out, with a rain plan.

Terri Witek is the author of four books of poems-- Exit Island (2012), The Shipwreck Dress (2008), a Florida Book Award winner; Carnal World (2006); Fools and Crows (2003); and Courting Couples (2000), a Center for Book Arts Prize winner. She holds the Sullivan Chair in Creative Writing at Stetson University where she has received the McInery Award for Teaching and the John Hague Teaching Award for outstanding teaching in the liberal arts and sciences.

Sunday, August 26, 2012

2012 Conference Sunday Advanced Workshops

2012 Conference Sunday Advanced Workshops

Optional Advanced Writing Workshops

The new Advanced Breakthrough Workshops being offered for the first time can be taken without full conference registration. Those rates are: Sunday Advanced Breakthrough Workshops Only: $100 for members, $125 nonmembers; Member Students, $55 Sunday only; Nonmember Students $70 Sunday only.   Register here:  http://floridarts.org/other-words-conference/2012-conference-registration/

Mark Powell
Fiction
Sunday, Nov. 11th

"Getting it on the page" This workshop will focus on the process of moving from an initial idea to a solid (if not final) draft. We will examine a number of passages by published writers.

Mark Powell is the author of the novels Prodigals, Blood Kin, and The Dark Corner. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Breadloaf Writers' Conference. He teaches fiction writing at Stetson University.
Ira Sukrungruang
Non Fiction
Sunday, Nov. 11th

In this workshop session writers will explore the nature and balance of scene and exposition in their nonfiction and investigate other structures besides chonology. Though scene is used in fiction, how one approaches scene and dialogue is different when dealing with real life events. Students will write and share their work with the workshop group. 

Ira Sukrungruang is author of the memoir Talk Thai: The Adventures of Buddhist Boy and the co-editor of What Are You Looking At? The First Fat Fiction Anthology and Scoot Over, Skinny: The Fat Nonfiction Anthology. He has published his essays, poems, and short stories in many literary journals and anthologies, including Creative Nonfiction, The Bellingham Review, North American Review, Isotope, Crab Orchard Review, Post Road, and Tilting the Continent: Southeast Asian American Writing He is the editor of Sweet: A Literary Confection (sweetlit.com), and teaches in the MFA program at University of South Florida. For more information about him, please visit: www.sukrungruang.com.

Terri Witek
Poetry
Sunday, Nov. 11th

Topic: “Site-Specific St Augustine.”   After an introductory exercise, Sunday poets will become flaneurs and flaneuses, wandering the city with a series of prompts designed to generate new work. Intervals inside and out, with a rain plan.

Terri Witek is the author of four books of poems-- Exit Island (2012), The Shipwreck Dress (2008), a Florida Book Award winner; Carnal World (2006); Fools and Crows (2003); and Courting Couples (2000), a Center for Book Arts Prize winner. She holds the Sullivan Chair in Creative Writing at Stetson University where she has received the McInery Award for Teaching and the John Hague Teaching Award for outstanding teaching in the liberal arts and sciences.

2012 Conference--Friday and Saturday Workshops

2012 Conference--Friday and Saturday Workshops

Optional Writing Workshops

Workshops are optional items not included in general conference registration.  Conference Registration is here. 

Friday Workshops

Bob Kunzinger
Non Fiction--Travel Writing
Friday, Nov. 9th 
"Everything I write is true but this actually happened": a workshop where we mix the reality of an event and the digression of what is and isn't true.

Bob Kunzinger is the author of five collections of essays, including the forthcoming "Borderline Crazy" (Nov 2012). He is a repeat offender for such diverse publications as Southern Humanities Review, The Chronicle of Higher Education, as well as many other regional and national reviews, and his work has been noted in Best American Essays.

Mark Powell
Fiction
Friday, Nov. 9th
"Reading like a Writer". This workshop will use a number of passages to examine what we can learn from published writers.
 
Mark Powell is the author of the novels Prodigals, Blood Kin, and The Dark Corner. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Breadloaf Writers' Conference. He teaches fiction writing at Stetson University.

Terri Witek
Poetry
Friday, Nov. 9th
Poets will generate new work in Flagler College's Crisp-Ellert Museum (next door to the main conference building). Friday and Saturday workshops will be different experiences: each will feature separate poetry challenges, some suggested by workshop participants. Visual artists and photographers also welcome.

Terri Witek is the author of four books of poems-- Exit Island (2012), The Shipwreck Dress (2008), a Florida Book Award winner; Carnal World (2006); Fools and Crows (2003); and Courting Couples (2000), a Center for Book Arts Prize winner. She holds the Sullivan Chair in Creative Writing at Stetson University where she has received the McInery Award for Teaching and the John Hague Teaching Award for outstanding teaching in the liberal arts and sciences.

Saturday Workshops

 
Jeff Bens
Screenwriting
Saturday, Nov. 10th
This workshop will look at effective ways to write for the screen. We'll watch film clips, study scenes from celebrated screenplays and complete exercises to help get at how to make stories and characters believable, enjoyable and compelling. For all levels of writers.

Jeff Bens directs the undergraduate creative writing program at Manhattanville College. He is author of the novel Albert, Himself and director of the documentary film, Fatman's. His short fiction and essays are published widely. Jeff has served on film festival juries around the world including the 2011 Slamdance feature film jury. He was a founding faculty of the School of Filmmaking at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts.

Ira Sukrungruang
Non Fiction
Saturday, Nov. 10th
Topic: "Exploring the Malleability of the Essay Form"— This seminar is dedicated to the amebic nature of the essay form. We will evaluate alternative ways of structuring an essay, create our own structures, and discuss how the essay form is a blueprint of our brains. We will also examine how an essayist creates order out of disorder and the close relationship the essay has to poetry.

Ira Sukrungruang is author of the memoir Talk Thai: The Adventures of Buddhist Boy and the co-editor of What Are You Looking At? The First Fat Fiction Anthology and Scoot Over, Skinny: The Fat Nonfiction Anthology. He has published his essays, poems, and short stories in many literary journals and anthologies, including Creative Nonfiction, The Bellingham Review, North American Review, Isotope, Crab Orchard Review, Post Road, and Tilting the Continent: Southeast Asian American Writing He is the editor of Sweet: A Literary Confection (sweetlit.com), and teaches in the MFA program at University of South Florida. For more information about him, please visit: www.sukrungruang.com.

Terri Witek
Poetry
Saturday, Nov. 10th  

Poets will generate new work in Flagler College's Crisp-Ellert Museum (next door to the main conference building). Friday and Saturday workshops will be different experiences: each will feature separate poetry challenges, some suggested by workshop participants. Visual artists and photographers also welcome.
Poets will generate new work in Flagler College's Crisp-Ellert Museum (next door to the main conference building).  Friday and Saturday workshops will be different experiences:  each wil feature separate poetry challenges, some suggested by workhop participants.  Visual artists and photographers also welcome.

Terri Witek is the author of four books of poems-- Exit Island (2012), The Shipwreck Dress (2008), a Florida Book Award winner; Carnal World (2006); Fools and Crows (2003); and Courting Couples (2000), a Center for Book Arts Prize winner. She holds the Sullivan Chair in Creative Writing at Stetson University where she has received the McInery Award for Teaching and the John Hague Teaching Award for outstanding teaching in the liberal arts and sciences.

Monday, August 13, 2012

Florida Book Awards 2012

From: http://floridabookawards.wordpress.com/2012/07/12/2012-florida-book-awards-competition-is-now-open/

The Florida Book Awards has kicked off its seventh annual competition with a call for entries in nine categories.


Established in 2006 and now the most comprehensive state book awards program in the nation, the contest recognizes and celebrates the year’s best books penned by full-time residents of the Sunshine State (with the exception of submissions to the Florida Nonfiction and Visual Arts categories, whose authors may live elsewhere.)

The contest categories include General Fiction,Young Adult Literature, Children’s Literature, Florida Nonfiction, Poetry, Popular Fiction, Visual Arts, Spanish Language Book, and a new category forGeneral Nonfiction. Entries, which can be submitted by anyone (e.g. publisher, author or literary agent), must have both an original publication date between Jan. 1, 2012, and Dec. 31, 2012, and an International Standard Book Number (ISBN).

Applicants are encouraged to submit their booksinto competition any time after the competition is launched, and as soon aspossible after books are officially published. All entries must be received no later than 5 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 1, 2012 (this is not a postmark deadline). Three-person juries –– including members of co-sponsoring organizations, subject experts from the faculties of Florida colleges and universities, and previous Florida Book Award winners –– will choose up to three finalists in each of nine categories. In each category, the jury may award one Gold, Silver and Bronze medal.

Co-sponsors of the competition include humanitiesorganizations from across the state such as the Florida Center for the Book; the State Library and Archives of Florida; the Florida Historical Society; the Florida Humanities Council; the Florida Literary Arts Coalition; the Florida Library Association; the Florida Association for Media in Education; the Florida Center for Literature and Theatre; the Florida Chapter of the Mystery Writers of America; Friends of FSU Libraries; the Florida Writers Association; the Governor’s Family Literacy Initiative; and “Just Read, Florida!”

Friday, August 3, 2012

Michael Martone on FLAC Writer's Circuit in September

Plan to attend (dates below)!

Michael Martone's most recent books are Four for a Quarter; Not Normal, Illinois: Peculiar Fiction from the Flyover; Racing in Place:  Collages, Fragments, Postcards, Ruins, a collection of essays; and Double-wide, his collected early stories. Michael Martone, a memoir in contributor’s notes, Unconventions, Writing on Writing, and Rules of Thumb, edited with Susan Neville, were all published recently. He is also the author of The Blue Guide to Indiana, published by FC2. The University of Georgia Press published his book of essays, The Flatness and Other Landscapes, winner of the AWP Award for Nonfiction, in 2000.













 
Wed, 9/19—Miami Dade College (Miami)

Thurs, 9/20—University of Tampa (Tampa)

Friday, 9/21—University of South Florida (Tampa)

Saturday, 9/22—Edison College (Ft Myers)

Monday, 9/24—Eckerd College (St. Petersburg)

Tuesday, 9/25—Valencia College (Orlando) and

Tuesday, 9/25 —College of Central Florida (Ocala)

Wednesday, 9/26—Flagler College (St Augustine)






Poet Jennifer Key Wins 2012 Tampa Review Prize


Jennifer Key, of Pinehurst, North Carolina, has been named winner of the 2012 Tampa Review Prize for Poetry. Key receives the eleventh annual prize for her manuscript entitled The Old Dominion. In addition to a $2,000 check, the award includes book publication in Spring 2013 by the University of Tampa Press. This will be Key’s first book.

Jennifer Key teaches creative writing at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke, where she serves as the editor of Pembroke Magazine. She was the 2006-2007 Diane Middlebrook Fellow at the University of Wisconsin and was educated at the University of Virginia where she was a Henry Hoyns Fellow. Her work has won the Poetry Center of Chicago’s Juried Reading, The Southwest Review’s McGinnis-Ritchie Award for Fiction, and Shenandoah’s Graybeal-Gowen Prize for Virginia Writers. Her poetry has appeared in The Antioch Review, The Carolina Quarterly, Callaloo, and elsewhere.

Tampa Review judges commented that The Old Dominion “spoke to us with exceptional, insistent images and ideas—a collection of continuously engaging poems and peak experiences” in a “gorgeous debut collection.”

“Key’s confident, self-assured voice guides the reader through both sweeping and specific landscapes,” the judges said. “The poet’s deft hand at her craft, and her keen, unexpected details make the reader perfectly comfortable on every plane.

“Yet, for all that confidence, Key reminds us that confidence and certainty are not dominion,” they wrote. “A line from the last poem of the book reads, ‘Lord, can anyone rescue us from ourselves?’ The question remains unanswered, lingering in the reader’s mind. . . . Fact is, the invention of everything in Key’s world—knowledge, identities, memories, even the invention of poems themselves—is under siege while safely protected in this poet’s immense talent.”

A selection of poems from The Old Dominion will appear as a “sneak preview” in one of the next issues of Tampa Review, the award-winning hardback literary journal published by the University of Tampa Press. Key’s book will be published during National Poetry Month in April 2013 and launched with a reading tour of Florida sponsored by the Florida Literary Arts Coalition.