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Fourth Mondays at 7:00 p.m. New Location! Bohemian Cafe & Restaurant 2 West Stone Avenue Emrys' Reading Room series features regional writers who are published and read nationally. We invite you to hear poets, novelists, and essayists of the Southeast read from their work, ask questions of them, and enjoy fellowship with other friends of the arts. The Upstate also nurtures emerging writers, particularly at the Greenville Fine Arts Center and the SC Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities.
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January 25
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Marc Fitten Marc Fitten was born in Brooklyn in 1974. He spent much of the 1990s living and traveling in Hungary, where he drew some of the details of his first novel, Valeria’s Last Stand, published by Bloomsbury in May 2009. He is currently the editor of The Chattahoochee Review, Atlanta’s oldest journal.
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George Singleton George Singleton has published short stories everywhere there’s paper. His stories have been anthologized in eight issues of New Stories from the South. He has published four collections: These People Are Us, The Half-Mammals of Dixie, Why Dogs Chase Cars, Drowning in Gruel; two novels: Novel and Work Shirts for Madmen; and one book of advice for writers: Pep Talks, Warnings and Screeds. George was born in Anaheim, California, grew up in Greenwood, graduated from Furman University, and got his MFA from UNC-Greensboro. George has taught English and fiction writing at Francis Marion College, the Fine Arts Center of Greenville County, and the South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities. He is a 2009 Guggenheim Fellow. He lives in Pickens County, South Carolina, with the clay artist Glenda Guion and a number of stray dogs and one cat.
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February 22
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Bill Aarnes Raised in North Dakota, William Aarnes attended Oberlin College and did graduate work at both The Catholic University of America and The Johns Hopkins University. He now teaches as Furman University and lives with his wife and daughter in Clemson, South Carolina. He has published two collections of poems--Learning to Dance (1991) and Predicaments (2001)--both published by Ninety-Six Press. Over the years he has had poetry published in FIELD, The American Scholar, and Poetry. His poems have appeared recently in The Valparaiso Review, The Southern Review, and Measure and he has others forthcoming in Shenandoah, the Seneca Review, The Literary Review, and anti-poetry.
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Mamie Morgan Mamie Morgan grew up in Spartanburg, South Carolina, and graduated from Wofford College as an English and Religion major. She completed her MFA from UNC Wilmington in 2006 and has taught poetry at the Governor’s School since then. She works also as a full-time waitress and is in the thick of completing her first full collection of poems. |
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Kathryn Scheldt and Frye Gaillard: Literature of Southern Music Fairhope singer-songwriter Kathryn Scheldt and University of South Alabama writer in residence Frye Gaillard are currently presenting programs on “the literature of Southern music” at venues across the South. Their appearances feature Scheldt performing songs from her latest CD, Southern Girl, which is already drawing rave reviews from regional critics. On their current tour, Gaillard opens each program with a talk about the power of southern music, reading from his books Watermelon Wine:Remembering the Golden Years of Country Music and With Music and Justice for All: Some Southerners and Their Passions. Scheldt then follows with songs deeply rooted in the Gulf Coast South, reflecting the joy and pain – and occasional whimsy – of a womanʼs journey through our time and place. All of the songs are Scheldt originals, including ten co-written with Gaillard. The Southern Girl CD, which features some of the finest musicians in the South, was recorded in Nashville and Daphne, AL. Gaillardʼs Watermelon Wine, regarded as a classic on the spirit of country music, was recently re-released in paperback by NewSouth Books.
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Students from the Fine Arts Center and the Governor's school The Reading Room highlights this developing talent each spring.Open to the public. |
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Elise Blackwell Elise Blackwell is the author of four novels Hunger, The Unnatural History of Cypress Parish, Grub, and An Unfinished Score, published in April 2010. Her books have been chosen for numerous “best of the year” lists, including the Los Angeles Times, Sydney Morning Herald, and Kirkus. Her short stories and cultural criticism have appeared in Witness, Topic, Seed, Global City Review, Quick Fiction, and other publications. She teaches creative writing at the University of South Carolina.
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Jillian Weis Jillian Weise was born in Houston, Texas in 1981. Her poetry collections are The Amputee's Guide to Sex and Translating the Body. Her poem "Incision" was animated and produced by PBS and the Poetry Foundation for "Poetry Everywhere." She received fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center, the Fulbright Program and the University of North Carolina-Greensboro before joining the faculty at Clemson. The Colony, published in March 2010, is her first novel. |
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