A Grant for Crab Orchard Review!

Crab Orchard Review is pleased to announce that the journal has received a grant of $6,170 from the Illinois Arts Council. This grant is for general operating support for fiscal year 2008.

Hearty Congratulations to...

Chad Parmenter (MFA '05), whose poem "Batellite, Batellite of Love" was chosen by judge Dean Young as the poetry winner in this year's Black Warrior Review Poetry and Fiction Contest. Chad will receive $1000, and his poem will appear in the Spring 2008 issue of Black Warrior Review.

About this poem, Chad writes:
"These Batman poems have been some of the most fun of anything I've worked on in my life, and your suggestion at SIU-C, to bring in some of the villains, has helped them all, this poem in particular."

Congrats, CP!

Black Warrior Review's website:

Black Warrior Review

Writers on the Road Reading--November 30, 2007

The Graduate Writers Forum
of Southern Illinois University Carbondale
presents the second installment of

Writers on the Road

featuring fiction and poetry readings
by graduate writing students from

Columbia College Chicago
and
University of Missouri-Saint Louis


Friday, November 30, 2007
SIUC Student Center ~ Mississippi Room

3 p.m. ~ Readers from Columbia College Chicago’s Fiction MFA Program
4 p.m. ~ Readers from University of Missouri - St. Louis’s MFA Program
5 p.m. ~ Readers from Columbia College Chicago’s Poetry MFA Program

All are welcome. Please spread the word.

Reminder: Career Talk for MFAs and Friends

REMINDER:

DO FRIES GO WITH THAT POEM? : A CAREER SEMINAR FOR CREATIVE WRITERS (AND THEIR FRIENDS)

Professors Pinckney Benedict and Allison Joseph invite you to a Career Seminar for MFA students (and any and all other interested students).

Where: Wednesday, November 28
When: from 4-5:30 pm
Where: in the Student Center Missouri Room.


This seminar will focus on

-resume and CV preparation
-job application etiquette for academic & non-academic jobs
-finding and applying for fellowships and grants for creative writers
-applying for/attending writing conferences and colonies


All are welcome to attend.
Event sponsored by the Graduate Writers Forum,
MFA Program in Creative Writing,
Department of English, Southern Illinois University Carbondale

New poems by Michael Meyerhofer (MFA '06)

New poems by Michael Meyerhofer appear in the latest issue of Arts & Letters (Issue Eighteen, Fall 2007). The poems are "Limbic Self-Loathing, Post Emperor's Chicken," and "Late September."

Congrats, MM!

Allison Joseph reads tonight at the Ohio State University

The OSU Creative Writing Program Reading Series will present poet Allison Joseph on Thursday, November 15, 2007. Joseph will participate in a Forum/Q&A at 4:00 p.m. and give a public reading at 7:00 p.m. -- both in the Denney Hall Commons Room, 311 Denney Hall.

Allison Joseph is the author of What Keeps Us Here (Ampersand, 1992), Soul Train (Carnegie Mellon, 1997), In Every Seam (Pittsburgh, 1997), Imitation of Life (Carnegie Mellon, 2003) and Worldly Pleasures (Word Press, 2004). Her honors include the John C. Zacharis First Book Prize, fellowships from the Bread Loaf and Sewanee Writers Conferences, and an Illinois Arts Council Fellowship in Poetry. She is editor and poetry editor of Crab Orchard Review and director of the Young Writers Workshop, an annual summer residential creative writing workshop for high school writers. She holds the Judge Williams Holmes Cook Endowed Professorship at Southern Illinois University Carbondale.

(event description courtesty the Ohio State Univ. English Dept. website).

Contest for current SIUC Students (Undergrads and Grads)

Announcing the 2007 Andy P. Smith Writing Contest
Department of English, Southern Illinois University Carbondale
Open to SIUC Undergraduate and Graduate Students only

First prize: $200
Second Prize: $50

First and Second Prizes awarded to both an undergraduate and a graduate student

The topic for this year: How does integrity play a part in the world at large or in your chosen field?

Essay Guidelines:
Length: 1000-1500 words

Submission format:
Do not write your name or any identifying information on the essay.
Submit your essay with a coversheet bearing the following information:

Name
Address, phone number, e-mail (please include permanent contact information if you are graduating
this year).
Year in school and major
Essay title

Essays should be sent to Jennifer Justice (awards coordinator) in the Department of English (Faner 2380-Mailcode 4503, if using campus mail), and should arrive no late than 4 pm, January 30, 2008.

Upcoming "Writers on the Road" Visitors

Shanie Latham, the source of all that is good, tells me:

"We will be hosting an installment of Writers on the Road on Friday Nov. 30, from 3 to 6:30 p.m., featuring readers from both the poetry and the fiction programs at Columbia College Chicago, as well as readers from University of Missouri - St. Louis."

Welcome Columbia and UMSL writers!

Rodney Jones, Aimee Mann, and Poetry Daily

Rodney Jones is featured on Poetry Daily today, with the poem "Deathly"--a poem that references both Aimee Mann and Carbondale:

Poetry Daily

Aimee Mann's website:

Aimee Mann

Mark Your Calendars: Career Seminar for MFA Graduate Students

Professors Benedict and Joseph will host their annual Career Seminar for MFA students (and whoever else is interested) on Wednesday, November 28 from 4-5:30 pm in the Student Center Missouri Room.

This seminar will focus on
-resume and CV preparation
-job application etiquette for academic & non-academic jobs
-finding and applying for fellowships and grants for creative writers
-applying for/ attending writing conferences and colonies

All are welcome to attend.
Event sponsored by the Graduate Writers Forum,
Department of English, Southern Illinois University Carbondale

Road Trip for "Writers on the Road"!

SIUC MFA writers will be taking their act on the road--thanks, Shanie, for the details:

"The details about our first road trip for Writers on the Road: Jason Brown, John Flaherty, Andrew Lewellen, and Shanie Latham will read on the U of Illinois campus as part of their "Voice Reading Series" on Thursday Nov. 15. Reading starts at 8 p.m. and also will include readers other than us (I believe from U of I.) I was not given the actual name of the place we'll be in, but the address is 1209 W. Oregon St. in Urbana."

Matt Guenette poems up on DIAGRAM

New poems by Matt Guenette (MFA '99) are now online at DIAGRAM:

DIAGRAM

Poemspotting: Melanie Jordan edition

A new poem, "False Attribution," by Melanie Jordan (MFA '01, poetry) appears in the Fall 2007 issue of the Southern Indiana Review.

Jason Brown Poems forthcoming in Post Road

Another gem from the morning mail, from multitalented third-year fiction MFA student Jason Brown:

"Post Road has accepted my poems “My Older Brother, June Bug” and “Name I Will Never Forget” for publication."

Congrats, Jason!

Visit Post Road:
Post Road

Pushcart for Pinckney!

Pinckney Benedict is way too modest (from my e-mail this morning):

"Hi, Allison. For what it’s worth, I have received Pushcart Prize XXXII: Best of the Small Presses 2008. It contains my story, “Mercy,” published in Ontario Review about this time last year."

Congratulations, PB!

Just because Devil's Kitchen's over...

doesn't mean that the literary doings stop in Carbondale!
Here's a summary of upcoming literary events. All are free and open
to the public.

Oct 31: Grassroots, the undergraduate literary journal of SIUC, hosts a
Halloween Literary Open Mic that will take place this Wednesday
(Halloween) from 7:30-10:00pm in the Big Muddy Room
(basement of the SIUC Student Center). Come dressed in costume
(or not, if you wish) to share and/or listen to original
poetry or prose with the undergraduate creative writing community.
Yummy treats will be provided.

Nov 1: MFA Program Graduate Student Reading
Kaskaskia/Missouri Room, 5 pm, SIUC Student Center

Laura Gross, first-year MFA student, poetry
Justin Benton, first-year MFA student, fiction
Kerry James Evans, second-year MFA, poetry

Nov 6: Native American poet Sherwin Bitsui
7 p.m. – Sherwin Bitsui (Diné) with contemporary Native American Poetry
including readings from his book "Shapeshift" and more recent works.
He'll also discuss the importance of poetry in Native American education and identity.
Originally from the White Cone, Ariz. Navajo Reservation,
A Diné of the Tocich'ii'nii (Bitter Water Clan)
and borne of the Tl'zilani (Many Goats Clan),
he currently resides in Tucson, Ariz. Event to be held in the
Ohio Room on the second floor of the Student Center.

Nov 7: Reading and Drinking, Open Mike at Melange, 7pm
607 S. Illinois Avenue, Carbondale.

Nov 12: Laura Benedict reads from her literary thriller, Isabella Moon,
for Sigma Tau Delta (English Honors Society).
6-7 pm, Mackinaw Room, Student Center.
For more about the book and Laura, visit www.laurabenedict.com.
She will read from her newly published novel and answer questions about her work.

Pinckney's a Great Man...and Judge!

from my esteemed colleague Pinckney Benedict:

"For the blog, whenever it’s convenient: For what it’s worth, just wanted to tell you that I served as judge, along with Amy Hempel and Lynn Freed, for the Chicago Tribune’s Nelson Algren Awards this year. This was a particular pleasure because I won the Algren way back in 1986.

The description of the awards is as follows:

“The Nelson Algren awards are for short fiction. Submissions must be written by an American and must be unpublished. One $5,000 prize and three runner-up prizes of $1,500 are awarded. The award is given in memory of Chicago author Nelson Algren.”

It looks as though they’ll begin accepting submissions for next year’s awards beginning November 1. Everybody in the program who has a story should enter."

To find the guidelines, visit the Chicago Tribune's web site at http://www.chicagotribune.com/
and put "Algren Awards" in the search box.

Paul Guest (MFA '99) Named a Whiting Fellow

The official announcement!

Whiting Foundation

Article in Atlanta Journal Constitution:

AJC

And Now a Word from Mark Vannier

Melanie Dusseau (MFA '03) sent me this about fellow MFA grad Mark Vannier:

I think Mark is too shy to send you his "clippings,"
as he calls them. Here he is on Chicago Public Radio
reading a sketch with other comedy writers:

WBEZ

Scoll down to "Hello Beautiful." It is segment two,
you can click on the "listen" tab and his story starts
at about minute three. Cool stuff! I thought the MFA
blog would like to hear from him.

Thanks, Mel D!

Be on the lookout for...

new poems by Matt Guenette (MFA '99):

"Have 4 poems forthcoming: 2 in Diagram, 2 in Poetry Midwest."

Thanks for the update, Matt. Let us know when the poems are published!