All Over Albany

NYS Writers Institute visiting writers fall 2015

The fall lineup for the NYS Writers Institute visiting writers series is out. And, as usual, it's full of notable, award-winning writers and names you'll recognize.

Here's the full lineup, compressed and expanded...

All blurbage via the NYS Writers Institute.

Condensed schedule

September 10 and 11: Tom Junod, award-winning journalist

September 24: Conjunctions reading with Bradford Morrow, Ann Lauterbach, and Peter Straub

September 25: DETROPIA: Film screening and discussion with director Rachel Grady

September 29: Ann Beattie, novelist and short story writer, and Peg Boyers, poet

October 6: Casey Schwartz, science writer

October 13: Adam Johnson, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, and short story writer

October 16: OXYANA: Film screening and discussion with director Sean Dunne

October 20: American Shakespeare Center performance of Julius Caesar

October 22: Mark Bittman, food writer and New York Times columnist

October 29: Mary Gaitskill, novelist and short story writer

November 5: Donald Antrim, fiction writer and memoirist

November 6: THE FITZGERALD FAMILY CHRISTMAS: Film screening and discussion with actor/director Edward Burns

November 7: "A Celebration of Women in the Arts," featuring playwright Tina Howe

November 12: Bernard F. Conners, novelist, memoirist, and publisher

November 17: Jason Reynolds, young adult novelist and poet

November 19: Ginger Strand, fiction and nonfiction author

Expanded schedule

September 10: Tom Junod, award-winning journalist
Seminar on magazine journalism -- 4:15 p.m., Standish Room, Science Library
Tom Junod, UAlbany graduate and a writer-at-large for Esquire, is the author of some of the most celebrated pieces in American magazine writing. He has been a finalist for the National Magazine Award a record 11 times, winning twice. Many of his articles are widely republished and frequently assigned in college journalism classes. He has also written for Atlantic Magazine, Sports Illustrated, and GQ.

September 11th, Huxley Theatre, NYS Museum, Albany, at 7 p.m.
Tom Junod will ... read from and discuss his article "The Falling Man," a 2003 meditation on AP photographer Richard Drew's iconic image of a 9/11 victim plunging to his death. For additional information on Junod's presentation call (518) 442-3083. [AOA adds: The NYS Museum listing for this event notes "Registration is recommended, but not necessary: email nicole.lafountain@nysed.gov or call (518) 474-0575."]

September 24: Conjunctions reading with Bradford Morrow, Ann Lauterbach, and Peter Straub
Reading -- 8:00 p.m., Recital Hall, Performing Arts Center
Conjunctions, a literary magazine based at Bard College, has been called "One of our most distinctive and valuable literary magazines....innovative, daring, indispensable, and beautiful" (PEN American Center). Three major writers involved with the magazine will read from their own work.

Bradford Morrow, founding editor of Conjunctions, novelist, essayist, and poet
Morrow's latest novel is The Forgers (2014), a literary thriller about books, murder, and forgery, and a Publishers Weekly Top 10 Mystery/Thriller for 2014. Joyce Carol Oates called it, "brilliantly written.... lethally enthralling." Other novels by Morrow include The Diviner's Tale (2011), and The Almanac Branch (1991), a PEN/Faulkner Award finalist. For his work at Conjunctions, Morrow received the PEN/Magid Award for Magazine Editing.

Ann Lauterbach, poet, essayist, and contributing editor of Conjunctions
Celebrated for poetry of ravishing intensity, Lauterbach is a past winner of a MacArthur Fellowship. Her recent collections include Under the Sign (2013), and Or to Begin Again (2009), a National Book Award finalist. Novelist Don DeLillo has said "Ann Lauterbach's poetry is quantum-packed inside its own reality, releasing beams of light and time that bend across the world of human beauty."

Peter Straub, horror writer, poet, and contributing editor of Conjunctions
One of America's preeminent authors of horror fiction, Peter Straub received the Bram Stoker Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2005. Five of his books have also won the Bram Stoker Award, including A Dark Matter (2010), 5 Stories (2007), In the Night Room (2004), Lost Boy, Lost Girl (2003), Mr. X (1999), and The Throat (1993). Other bestselling novels include Ghost Story (1979) and Julia (1975), as well as two coauthored with Stephen King: Black House (2001) and The Talisman (1984).

September 25: DETROPIA: Film screening and discussion with director Rachel Grady
7:00 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus
Directed by Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing (United States, 2012, 90 minutes, color). Nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance and winner of the Editing Award, DETROPIA is a visually stunning exploration of the disintegration of Detroit. The New Yorker's David Denby called it "the most moving documentary I've seen in years....an ardent love letter to past vitality....a beautiful film."

Rachel Grady and collaborator Heidi Ewing shared a 2007 Best Documentary Oscar nomination for JESUS CAMP, about children attending an evangelical Christian summer program. Other films by Grady and Ewing include 12TH & DELAWARE (2010), winner of a prestigious Peabody Award, and THE BOYS OF BARAKA (2005), winner of the Gold Hugo for Best Documentary at the Chicago International Film Festival, and an NAACP Image Award.

September 29: Ann Beattie, novelist and short story writer, and Peg Boyers, poet
Seminar -- 4:15 p.m., Standish Room, Science Library
Reading -- 8:00 p.m., Recital Hall, Performning Arts Center

Ann Beattie is one of America's most celebrated practitioners of the short story form. She has received the 2000 PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in Short Fiction and the 2005 Rea Award for the Short Story in addition to having work featured in numerous prize anthologies. Her newest book is The State We're In: Maine Stories (2015), set in her adopted home state. In a starred review, Publishers Weekly praised Beattie's "craftsmanship, precise language, and her knack for revealing psychological truths."

Peg Boyers spent her adolescence in Venice, Italy, which is the subject of her new poetry collection, To Forget Venice (2014). Poet Chase Twichell called it "a tour de force of ventriloquism...elegant, contemporary, and wry." Boyers' earlier collections include Honey With Tobacco (2007), and Hard Bread (2002). She teaches creative writing at Skidmore College and the NYS Summer Writers Institute, and is executive editor of Salmagundi.

October 6: Casey Schwartz, science writer
Seminar -- 4:15 p.m., D'Ambra Auditorium, Life Sciences Building (LSRB 2095)
Reading -- 8:00 p.m., Huxley Theatre, NYS Museum, Cultural Education Center, downtown Albany
Casey Schwartz is the author of the new book, In the Mind Fields: Exploring the New Science of Neuropsychoanalysis (2015), a witty, accessible, and entertaining introduction to new developments in brain science--notably the reconciliation of neuroscience and psychoanalysis. Scott Stossel, editor of The Atlantic, called it "a brilliant and enthralling exploration of a scientific and philosophical conundrum that has preoccupied thinkers from Descartes to Freud to Oliver Sacks: the relationship between brain and mind." A graduate of University College London with an MA in neuroscience, Schwartz has worked as a science and health reporter for Newsweek/The Daily Beast and other publications.

October 13: Adam Johnson, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, and short story writer
Seminar -- 4:15 p.m., Recital Hall, Performing Arts Center
Reading -- 8:00 p.m., Recital Hall, Performing Arts Center
Adam Johnson received the Pulitzer Prize for The Orphan Master's Son (2012). The Pulitzer Board described it as "an exquisitely crafted novel that carries the reader on an adventuresome journey into the depths of totalitarian North Korea and into the most intimate spaces of the human heart." Johnson's earlier books include the novel, Parasites Like Us (2003), and the story collection, Emporium (2002). His new story collection is Fortune Smiles (2015). Publishers Weekly said "Often funny, even when they're wrenchingly sad, the stories provide one of the truest satisfactions of reading: the opportunity to sink into worlds we otherwise would know little or nothing about."

October 16: OXYANA: Film screening and discussion with director Sean Dunne
7:00 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus
Directed by Sean Dunne (United States, 2013, 78 minutes, color). OXYANA is a harrowing profile of Oceana, West Virginia--a once-thriving coal town that has become the "capital" of the Oxycontin drug abuse epidemic. Featuring candid interviews with members of the shattered community, the film won two major awards at the Tribeca Film Festival: Best New Documentary Director, and Best Documentary Feature-Special Jury Mention.

Sean Dunne, a native of Peekskill, is known for films that focus on socially marginalized individuals, and for his ability to get his subjects to "open up" and share their stories. A former writer and producer for The History Channel, Dunne received an Emmy nomination for his short film, THE ARCHIVE.

October 20: American Shakespeare Center performance of Julius Caesar
Performance -- 7:30 p.m., Main Theatre, Performing Arts Center
Live music beginning at 7:00 p.m. Advance Tickets: $15 general public / $10 students, seniors & UAlbany faculty-staff. Day of Show Tickets: $20 general public / $15 students, seniors & UAlbany faculty-staff.
For tickets email: tickets@albany.edu or call the PAC Box Office at: (518) 442-3997

In this thrilling, and deeply human play, Shakespeare shows us a world on fire; a world where some of history's heroes commit horrific crimes in the name of patriotism and honor. A masterpiece of betrayal, violence, and perhaps most surprisingly, love, Julius Caesar will be presented in classic Shakespearean style with actors playing multiple roles, and surrounded by the audience on three sides.

October 22: Mark Bittman, food writer and New York Times columnist
Seminar -- 4:15 p.m., Recital Hall, Performing Arts Center
Presentation/interview -- 7:30 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus
Mark Bittman is one of America's best-known food writers. His 1998 bestseller, How to Cook Everything, which launched a series of best-selling sequels, has been described as "the bible of basic cooking for millions of Americans" (PBS). His newest book is A Bone to Pick--The good and bad news about food, with wisdom and advice on diets, food safety, GMOs, farming, and more (2015). Salon magazine said that the book "is destined to become a staple for those who want to consider, more deeply, what's on their plate." The author for 13 years of the widely-read New York Times food column, "The Minimalist," Bittman writes about food for the Opinion, Dining, and Magazine sections of the New York Times.

October 29: Mary Gaitskill, novelist and short story writer
Seminar -- 4:15 p.m., Campus Center Room 375
Reading -- 8:00 p.m., Campus Center Room 375
Mary Gaitskill received a National Book Award nomination for her 2005 novel, Veronica, and a PEN/Faulkner Award nomination for her 1997 story collection, Because They Wanted To. Her new novel, The Mare (2015), explores the evolving relationships among a Dominican girl from the inner city, a middle-aged white woman in Upstate New York, and the abused and spirited mare who transforms their lives. Bookshout! called the novel "Gaitskill's most poignant and powerful work yet...raw, striking, and completely original."

November 5: Donald Antrim, fiction writer and memoirist
Reading -- 4:15 p.m., Assembly Hall, Campus Center
Donald Antrim, 2013 MacArthur Fellow and frequent New Yorker contributor, has acquired a cult following for brilliant and wildly inventive fiction, including the novels, The Verificationist (2000) and The Hundred Brothers (1998), which was nominated for a PEN/Faulkner Award. His newest story collection is The Emerald Light in the Air (2014). Writing in Publishers Weekly, Joseph O'Neill called the stories "brilliant, antic, emotional... tremendously funny and moving" and said "I read them with that dreadful exhilaration that only the best writers can elicit."

November 6: THE FITZGERALD FAMILY CHRISTMAS: Film screening and discussion with actor/director Edward Burns
Reading -- 4:15 p.m., Lecture Center 5, Academic Podium
Screening - 7:00 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus
Directed by Edward Burns (United States, 2012, 99 minutes, color). Starring Kerry Bishé, Connie Britton, Edward Burns. Director Edward Burns returns to the Long Island family milieu of his earliest films with this holiday tale of siblings who await the arrival of the father who abandoned them 20 years earlier. The New York Times said Burns "manages the considerable feat of interweaving the personal dramas of nine members of a boisterous Irish-American clan into a coherent mosaic....[he] shuffles this dense material with the dexterity of a card shark."

Edward Burns is an award-winning filmmaker, actor, screenwriter, and former UAlbany student. His many films include THE BROTHER'S MCMULLEN (1995), winner of "Best Dramatic Film" at Sundance, and SHE'S THE ONE (1996), which helped launch the careers of Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Aniston, and Amanda Peet. In 1998, Burns starred in Steven Spielberg's Oscar-winning war epic, SAVING PRIVATE RYAN. His new memoir, Independent Ed (2015), provides a candid chronicle of the ups and downs of his career. Today's Matt Lauer said "Every young, hungry, creative person should view this as a textbook.... It's a how-to."

November 7: "A Celebration of Women in the Arts," featuring playwright Tina Howe
Musical and theatrical presentations -- 7:00 p.m., Recital Hall, Performing Arts Center
Tina Howe, 2015 recipient of the Master American Dramatist Award of the PEN/Laura Pels Foundation, will be the featured speaker at "A Celebration of Women in the Arts," which will also present a choral performance by students, and a staged reading of Howe's short comedy, Water Music (2000). Howe's other plays include two Pulitzer Prize finalists Painting Churches (1982) and Pride's Crossing (1997)-- winner of the New York Drama Critics Circle Award--and Coastal Disturbances (1986), which was nominated for a Best Play Tony Award.

November 12: Bernard F. Conners, novelist, memoirist, and publisher
Conversation with Paul Grondahl -- 8:00 p.m., Huxley Theatre, NYS Museum, Cultural Education Center, downtown Albany
Bernard F. Conners is a former FBI agent, Golden Gloves boxing champion, bestselling novelist, and Emmy-winning TV producer. He is also the former publisher of The Paris Review, one of the literary world's leading magazines. He recounts his remarkable rags-to-riches life story, his cloak-and-dagger escapades in Hoover's FBI, and his notable encounters with New York's "literati" in his new memoir, Cruising with Kate: A Parvenu in Xanadu (2015). His previous books include the true crime story, Tailspin (2001), and the novels The Hampton Sisters (1987) and Dancehall (1983).

November 17: Jason Reynolds, young adult novelist and poet
Reading -- 7:00 p.m., Huxley Theatre, NYS Museum, Cultural Education Center, downtown Albany
Jason Reynolds, YA novelist, writes smart, engaging books for "teenage boys who don't like to read." He received the American Library Association's Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe Award for When I Was the Greatest (2014), which Booklist called "urban fiction with heart, a meditation on the meaning of family, the power of friendship, and the value of loyalty." His new novels include The Boy in the Black Suit (2015), about a teenager coping with his mother's death, and All American Boys (2015, with Brendan Kiely), the story of two teens--one black, one white--and the repercussions of a single violent act.

November 19: Ginger Strand, fiction and nonfiction author
Seminar "A Writer in the Archive" -- 2:00 p.m., M. E. Grenander Special Collections Research Room, Science Library 350
Keynote Lecture, "The Brothers Vonnegut: Bernard Vonnegut and Kurt Vonnegut in GE's House of Magic" -- 7:30 p.m., Clark Auditorium, NYS Museum, Cultural Education Center, downtown Albany
Ginger Strand will talk about her new book The Brothers Vonnegut (2015), a wild collision of science and literature set against the backdrop of atomic anxiety, would-be weather warriors, and the dawn of the digital world. She will discuss using manuscripts, letters, GE dossiers, and interviews to trace the fascinating story of two brothers grappling with the moral dilemmas of their time. Part biography, part cultural history, her book chronicles how a desire to control the natural world shaped one of our most inventive novelists.

Ginger Strand's talk is a featured public event of the annual Researching New York Conference and is sponsored by the New York State Writers Institute; the University at Albany's Department of History and M.E. Grenander Archives and Special Collections; and the New York State Archives Partnership Trust. Further information on the entire Researching New York Conference, is available at: www.nystatehistory.org.