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OBU—Oklahoma Baptist University

Acclaimed Author to Visit Campus

October 4, 2012

OBU will host Woodrow Wilson visiting fellow Lynne Sharon Schwartz, an acclaimed novelist, essayist and poet, during the week of Oct. 8-12. She will visit an array of writing and literature classes during her visit to Bison Hill.

Schwartz is part of the nationally recognized program that sends professionals to private liberal arts campuses for a week of residency. The visits are made possible by the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation. They are intended to give college students an opportunity to see the work of contemporary authors.

The community is invited to attend a "Master Class on Writing Memoir" on Wednesday, Oct. 10, from 6-8 p.m. in the Geiger Center, room 212.

On Thursday, Oct. 11, Schwartz will offer a public reading of her works from 7-8 p.m. in the Geiger Center, room 212. Prior to the reading, she will be available to sign copies of her books from 6-6:45 p.m. in the OBU Bookstore on the lower level of the Geiger Center.

Schwartz is the author of 21 books. Her most recent publications are "Not Now, Voyager," an extended essay on the meaning of travel, and "See you in the Dark," a book of poems. Her most well-known novels are "The Writing on the Wall," "In the Family Way: An Urban Comedy," "Disturbances in the Field" and "Leaving Brooklyn," which was nominated for a PEN/Faulkner Award in fiction.

In addition to her original works, Schwartz has translated several books from Italian and has received grants from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York State Foundation for the Arts. Her stories and essays have been reprinted in numerous anthologies, including "The Best American Short Stories," "The O. Henry Prize Stories" and "The Best American Essays." Her criticism and reviews have appeared in leading magazines and newspapers.

Schwartz is on the faculty of the Bennington Writing Seminars, a graduate master's degree program, and she has taught writing and literature at colleges and universities in the U.S. and abroad, most recently at Columbia University and Bryn Mawr College.