MFA Residency: Wednesday, Jan. 4

Public Event Schedule

Join us for a faculty lecture at 11 a.m. in Canon Lounge in Gladfelter:

DEAN BAKOPOULOS: They Threw Me Off the Hay Truck: On Bafflement and Difficulty

In this lecture, we’ll examine the state of bafflement that is often the genesis of lasting literary work, and the slippery concept of difficulty, particularly when writing about the struggle for justice in times of violence and upheaval (political or personal). We’ll begin with a section of Ralph Ellison’s essay “Harlem is Nowhere,” and go from there, with a focus on the genres of magical realism and noir mystery. The lecture will likely refer to the fiction of Haruki Murakami, Helen Oyemi, James Cain, Valeria Luiselli, and Alain Mabanckou, and poems by Kevin Young, Jericho Brown, Tarfia Faizullah, Maram Al-Massri, and Ada Limón. No advance reading is necessary; handouts will be provided.

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Join us at 8:15 p.m. in Canon Lounge in Gladfelter for a reading featuring faculty members:

David Shields
Chase Twichell
Megan Staffel
Alan Williamson

For more information, including a full schedule of public events, please visit the program website at http://www.wwcmfa.org/public-schedule-for-mfa-winter-residency-is-here/.