The 40th Anniversary Reading Podcast!

(Warren Wilson MFA Faculty and Alumni) Founded in 1976 by Ellen Bryant Voigt as the nation’s first low-residency program, the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College has counted some of the country’s finest poets and fiction writers among its faculty and graduates. Continuing a tradition started by the program at Malaprop’s Bookstore in Asheville, NC—The Fastest Reading in the World—hour readers will be joined by other Warren Wilson MFA faculty and alumni in attendance to celebrate four decades of literary achievement.

Recorded in Los Angeles, April 1, 2016

Published Date: July 19, 2017

Short bios of our faculty and alumni readers:

(Pronunciation guide available upon request!)(jk/lol)

Dean Bakopoulos is the author of 3 novels, most recently Summerlong. He teaches at Grinnell College and has been on our faculty since 2009.

Natalie Baszile’s debut novel, Queen Sugar was adapted by Ava DuVernay for Oprah Winfrey’s network and is a ratings hit.  Natalie was a Holden Scholar and graduated in 2007.

Charles Baxter is the author of 13 works of fiction, poetry, and craft essays. He teaches at the University of Minnesota and has taught at WW for 29 years.

Robin Black is the is the author of 2 works of fiction and a just-published work of nonfiction, Crash Course: Essays from Where Writing and Life Collide. She graduated in 2005.

Marianne Boruch is the author of 8 poetry collections, 2 essay collections, and a memoir, and a recent winner of the Kingsley Tufts Award, among other accolades. She teaches at Purdue and has been teaching with us since 1988.

Karen Brennan graduated from our program in 1979 and is the author of 7 works of fiction, poetry, and nonfiction. She is Professor Emerita from the University of Utah, and she has taught in our program since 1993.

Gabrielle Calvocoressi third book, Rocket Fantastic, is forthcoming from Persea. She teaches at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and has taught at Warren Wilson for ten years.

Lan Samantha Chang is the author of a collection of short fiction, Hunger and two novels, Inheritance and All is Forgotten, Nothing Is Lost, and the recipient of numerous fellowships. Sam is the director of the Iowa Writers Workshop, and joined our faculty 16 years ago.

Victoria Chang’s third book of poems, The Boss, was published by McSweeney’s and won the PEN Center USA Literary Award and a California Book Award.  She was a Holden Scholar and graduated in 2005.

Jenny Johnson’s debut collection of poems, In Full Velvet, is forthcoming from Sarabande Books next year. She was a 2015 recipient of a Whiting Award, and she has recently been awarded a Hodder Fellowship at Princeton University. She graduated from our program in 2011.

A Van Jordan is the author of four collections of poetry, most recently The Cineaste. His numerous prizes include the 2015 Lannan Literary Award. Van was a Holden Scholar and graduated from our program in 1998; he has been on the WW faculty since 2004.

Rose McLarney is the author of two books of poetry, most recently Its Day Being Gone, selected for the National Poetry Series. She graduated from our program in 2010 and now is an assistant professor at Auburn.

Matthew Olzmann is the author of Mezzanines and Contradictions in the Design. He graduated from our program in 2009 and joined the faculty in 2016.

Meghan O’Rourke is the author of the memoir The Long Goodbye and the poetry collections Once and Halflife. Meghan graduated from WW in 2005 and now teaches at NYU and Princeton.

Kirstin Valdez Quade is the author of the story collection The Night of the Fiestas, published by Norton last year, which just won the John Leonard Award from the NBCC. She began teaching at Princeton in 2015 and with our program in January of this year.

Mary Szybist is the author of two collections of poetry, the most recent of which, Incarnadine, won the National Book Award. She teaches at Lewis and Clark College and joined our faculty in 2011

Peter Turchi’s books include Maps of the Imagination and A Muse and a Maze. Pete served as director of our program from 1993 until 2008. He teaches at the University of Houston and continues to teach with us every summer.

Monica Youn is the author of three collections of poetry including the forthcoming Blackacre, and Ignatz, which was a finalist for the National Book Award. She teaches at Princeton and has taught at Warren Wilson since 2014.

Dale Young is the author of three collections of poetry, most recently The Halo, and is the recipient of Guggenheim and NEA fellowships. He practices medicine in San Francisco and has taught with us since 2005.