Participation Type
Panel
Session Title
Session 10.06 Literature and Poetry
Presentation #1 Title
A Reading and Roundtable—Appalachian Poetry and Fiction: Reckoning with the Past and Embracing Change
Presentation #1 Abstract or Summary
Many Appalachian writers struggle with whether to look back or look toward the ever-changing present and uncertain future for substance and inspiration. Do they turn to nostalgia, to the pastoral, to the often mythic and idealized past, or do they embrace the gritty and seemingly soulless flux of contemporary Appalachia? These poets and fiction writers will explore this conflict in their own writing. Members of the core and guest faculty of West Virginia Wesleyan’s MFA Program (West Virginia’s only low-residency graduate creative writing program), these writers will each read a short selection from their original poetry or prose. Each will comment briefly on how he or she experiences this internal conflict when “writing Appalachia” as a contemporary writer, and when treating themes such as religion, gender, and landscape in works set in the Appalachian context. During the final fifteen minutes of the session, the writers will engage in conversation about these issues in their work—where they resonate, where they diverge. They will also welcome questions from the audience.
At-A-Glance Bio- Presenter #1
Jessie van Eerden is author of the novel Glorybound (WordFarm), winner of the 2012 ForeWord Reviews Editor’s Choice Fiction Prize, and her work has appeared in The Oxford American, Best American Spiritual Writing and Red Holler: An Anthology of Contemporary Appalachian Literature. She directs the low-residency MFA program of WV Wesleyan College.
At-A-Glance Bio- Presenter #2
Doug Van Gundy’s poems and essays have appeared in The Oxford American, Ecotone, Poems & Plays and The Louisville Review, and his first book of poems, A Life Above Water, was published by Red Hen Press. Doug is also an award-winning old-time musician whose music has been featured on three CDs, several short films, and National Public Radio’s Mountain Stage.
At-A-Glance Bio- Presenter #3
Mark DeFoe has published poems in Poetry, Yale Review, Paris Review, Christian Science Monitor, Salmagundi, and his tenth chapbook is In the Tourist Cave, published in 2012 by Finishing Line Press. Mark is a former Bread Loaf Scholar, and his work has received prizes and recognition from Appalachian Heritage, The Atlanta Review, and others.
At-A-Glance Bio- Presenter #4
Karen Salyer McElmurray’s Surrendered Child: A Birth Mother’s Journey, was an AWP Award Winner for Creative Nonfiction, and her novels are The Motel of the Stars, Editor’s Pick by Oxford American, and Strange Birds in the Tree of Heaven, winner of the Chaffin Award for Appalachian Writing. In Spring 2014, she will be the Lewis Rubin Writer-in-Residence at Hollins University.
A Reading and Roundtable—Appalachian Poetry and Fiction: Reckoning with the Past and Embracing Change
Corbly Hall 268
Many Appalachian writers struggle with whether to look back or look toward the ever-changing present and uncertain future for substance and inspiration. Do they turn to nostalgia, to the pastoral, to the often mythic and idealized past, or do they embrace the gritty and seemingly soulless flux of contemporary Appalachia? These poets and fiction writers will explore this conflict in their own writing. Members of the core and guest faculty of West Virginia Wesleyan’s MFA Program (West Virginia’s only low-residency graduate creative writing program), these writers will each read a short selection from their original poetry or prose. Each will comment briefly on how he or she experiences this internal conflict when “writing Appalachia” as a contemporary writer, and when treating themes such as religion, gender, and landscape in works set in the Appalachian context. During the final fifteen minutes of the session, the writers will engage in conversation about these issues in their work—where they resonate, where they diverge. They will also welcome questions from the audience.
