English DepartmentConceived in Fall of 2000 as “an experiment,” the English Department condensed its semester-long Blackburn Visiting Professorship to a “workshop-packed week” to give students an opportunity to meet distinguished authors throughout the school year. One or more authors are invited to campus each semester to visit creative writing classes, meet with students, lead a masterclass or workshop, and give a reading of their work. These shorter visits, initially for an entire week, evolved into the Blackburn Reading Series.
The Blackburn Reading Series as we know it now has been divided into fiction and poetry. Once a year, the English Department invites a major, active writer in fiction to visit campus for a public reading and a series of workshops with our creative writing students. On the poetry side of the Blackburn Reading Series, the English Department invites 2-4 poets over the course of the school year. We generally host 2 poets at a time who both participate in a public reading event and a series of workshops with our creative writing students. The goal of the Blackburn Reading Series is to bring contemporary, active writers to campus to work with our students, as well as to host a public event, in which anyone in our Duke and Durham community can participate.
Most Recent Guests
Albert Mobilio: Spring 2018
Elizabeth Willis: Spring 2018
Colson Whitehead: Spring 2018
Highlights from past years include:
Ann Lauterbach: Fall 2017
Ann Lauterbach is a prolific poet. A professor in creative writing at Bard College since 1991, Ann has walked many paths. She came to Duke in September of 2017 as the Blackburn Visiting Poet. Over the course of two days, she participated in workshops with students in our creative writing courses for poetry. She then performed numerous works old, new, and unpublished, for a significant crowd of students, faculty, and community members at the Branson Hall Brody Theater. Ann’s reading and book signing was a highly successful event as well as an honor to host.
Lauria Moriarty: Spring 2017
A long-time poet, the California-based Moriarty has published collections of poetry since as far back as 1980. She came to Duke in April of 2017 as one of the Blackburn Visiting Poets and participated in a classroom workshop with our Advanced Creative Writing students in poetry. Along with Ted Pearson, she performed some of her work during a public reading and book signing event at the East Duke Parlors.
Theodore Pearson: Spring 2017
Ted Pearson has been an active poet since the mid-1960’s. He has produced an immense volume of work since that time and continues to write and teach to this day. He came to Duke as one of two poets for the Blackburn Visiting Poets Reading Series in April of 2017. Along with poet Laura Moriarty, Ted participated in classroom workshops with the Advanced Creative Writing students in poetry. Later that day, he performed a number of poems spanning the decades of his body of work at the East Duke Parlors.
Laynie Brown: Fall 2016
Laynie Browne is a professor of creative writing in the distinguished creative writing program at the University of Pennsylvania. After receiving her MFA in poetry from Brown University, Laynie has published numerous collections of poems. Along with Norman Finkelstein, Laynie came to Duke in Fall of 2016 as one of the Blackburn Visiting Poets. With Norman, she participated in a special workshop class with the Advanced Creative Writing students. Later that day, she performed a selection of old and new (not yet published) works for an intimate crowd of students and faculty.
Norman Finkelstein: Fall 2016
A professor of English and Jewish Studies as Xavier University in Ohio, as well as an active poet for more than three decades, Norman Finkelstein was one of two poets to come to Duke as the Blackburn Visiting Poets in Fall of 2016. Along with Laynie Brown, Norman visited the Advanced Creative Writing courses in poetry for a special workshop with the students. Later that day at McClendon Commons, he performed a diverse selection of poems from his lengthy body of work.
Junot Diaz: Fall 2016
MIT professor and award-winning novelist Junot Diaz came to Duke in October of 2016 as the Blackburn Visiting Fiction Author. He participated in a special workshop class with all of the English Department’s Advanced Creative Writing Fiction students, prior to the public reading. At the Geneen Auditorium at the Fuqua School of Business, the English Department hosted hundreds of community residents and students for a lively Q & A with the author, a reading from his most recent novel, and a book signing.
Ha Jin: October 7, 2015
Novelist, poet, short story author and Professor of English at Boston University, Ha Jin gave a reading in the East Duke Parlors on October 7, 2015.
Born in China, Jin was a teenager when China entered the Cultural Revolution. He became a member of the People’s Liberation Army at the age of fourteen. His novel Waiting, which won him the National Book Award and the PEN/Faulkner Award was based on his experiences during his five-year service in the Red Army. He was awarded the PEN/Faulkner again for War Trash. He also received the PEN/Hemingway award for his first collection of short stories, Ocean of Words (1996), and the Flannery O’Connor prize for his second, Under the Red Flag (1997). He is also the author of: A Free Life, The Writer as Migrant, A Good Fall, and Nanjing Requiem.
Ed Roberson: Spring 2015
In spring 2015, the Duke community was invited to hear poet Ed Roberson read from his jazz-influenced works "Atmosphere Conditions" and "To See the Earth Before the End of the World."
Gish Jin: October 2014
In October 2014, novelist Gish Jen, author of The Love Wife and Tiger Writing gave a reading in McClendon Commons. Jen also met for discussion with students in an English class the following day.
Margaret Maron: October 2011
North Carolina author Margaret Maron taught a week-long creative writing workshop to students in October 2011. She capped off the week with a reading in the East Duke Parlor from her latest “Deborah Knott” mystery Three Day Town. Maron is the author of thirty novels and two collections of short stories. Winner of several major American awards for mysteries (Edgar, Agatha, Anthony, Macavity), her works are on the reading lists of various courses in contemporary Southern literature and have been translated into 16 languages. A native Tar Heel, she lives on her family's century farm a few miles southeast of Raleigh, the setting for Bootlegger's Daughter, which is numbered among the 100 Favorite Mysteries of the Century as selected by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association. In 2004, she received the Sir Walter Raleigh Award for best North Carolina novel of the year. In 2008, she was honored with the North Carolina Award for Literature. (The North Carolina Award is the state’s highest civilian honor.)
According to Maron, "The mystery novel is the peg upon which I hang my love and concerns for North Carolina as the state transitions from agriculture to high tech, from a largely rural countryside to one increasingly under assault by housing developments and chain stores and politicians more interested in catering to wealthy donors than working for ordinary Tar Heel citizens." Her books have looked at problems of race, migrant labor, politics, and unstructured growth.
James Salter: April 2-7, 2006
Fiction writer James Salter was in residence April 2-7, 2006. He visited creative writing classes, taught a master class on fiction writing, and met with students. He gave a reading in the Rare Book Room from his newest collection of short stories, Last Night. Salter’s other books of fiction and memoir include: A Sport and A Pastime, Dusk and Other Stories, and Gods of Tin: The Flying Years.
Diane Ackerman: March 20-24, 2006
Poet, essayist, and naturalist Diane Ackerman was the Blackburn Writer-in-Residence in March. During the week, she visited classes, taught a master class, and gave a public reading in the Rare Book Room of Perkins Library. Ackerman’s books of poetry include: Origami Bridges: Poems of Psychoanalysis and Fire, Jaguar of Sweet Laughter, and Lady Faustus. She has the rare distinction of having a molecule named after her: dianackerone.
Li-Young Lee: February 17-22, 2002
Poet Li-Young Lee was the Blackburn Writer-in-Residence in February 2002. In addition to reading from his recent book The City in Which I Love You, Lee led a workshop discussion with students and was available for informal meetings at both the Franklin Center and the Gothic Bookshop. He also gave a reading on March 25 at the Duke Museum of Art as part of the Blackburn Festival. Lee was born in Jakarta, Indonesia of Chinese parents. His family eventually moved to the United States to escape the political repression of the emerging Chinese regime, which imprisoned his father for nearly two years. In his poetry, Lee often reflects on his father’s early career as Mao Tse-tung’s personal physician, and later as the Presbyterian minister in a small Pennsylvania town. He has published a moving memoir of his family’s ancestry and refugee experiences, as well as his own childhood: The Winged Seed: A Remembrance.
Paul Auster: November 12-16, 2001
Paul Auster was the Blackburn Writer-in-Residence in November 2001. During his time here, Auster visited creative writing classes, gave a public reading from his work, and was available for informal visits with students. There was also a screening of his screenplay “Smoke” and a book signing. Auster is the author of many novels, including Timbuktu, Leviathan, The Music of Chance, and In the Country of Last Things. He has also written two memoirs, The Invention of Solitude and Hand to Mouth: A Chronicle of Early Failure, as well as a book of critical essays, The Art of Hunger. He wrote the screenplay for the movie “Smoke” and was co-director with Wayne Wang of “Blue in the Face.”
Yusef Komunyakaa: March 18-24, 2001
Poet Yusef Komunyakaa was invited to be the William Blackburn Visiting Professor for a week in March, 2001. Komunyakaa has written twelve books of poems, including Neon Vernacular, for which he received the Pulitzer Prize and the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. His awards and honors are numerous, including being elected a chancellor of The Academy of American Poets in 1999. Komunyakaa is a professor in the Council of Humanities and Creative Writing Program at Princeton University. During his week-long visit to Duke, he gave a public reading in the Rare Book Room at Perkins Library and visited creative writing classes.
Richard Ford: November 13-17, 2000
For a short time this month, a Pulitzer Prize winner was on the Department of English’s faculty. Richard Ford, author of Independence Day, four other novels, and a collection of short stories was invited to campus for a week in November as the William Blackburn Writer. He has been the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, two grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award for Literature, and the 1994 Rea Award. Independence Day is the only novel ever to have received both the Pulitzer Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award.
Ford’s visit marks the first time a Blackburn writer has come for such an abbreviated period. In the past, distinguished writers would come for an entire semester and teach two courses in creative writing. During his week-long stay, Ford lectured in classes, gave a reading in the Rare Book Room at Perkins Library, and chatted with students. He even held office hours. Ford said he tried to show student writers the impact they could have on their readers. “Writing can’t be taught like chemistry. It’s an art ….” he said. “It can be encouraged, entertained, but you can’t tell [students] that writing is necessarily their vocation. There are a lot of drawbacks to it, a lot of reasons for people not to succeed.” Ford said the best part of his visit was “sitting down in a relaxed manner with students.” Students seemed to enjoy this time with the writer as well. James Silver, a law student, appreciated Ford’s openness. “He’s totally willing to talk about his style of writing as well as his life,” he said. “He told us about why he writes and how.”
In addition to these authors, the Blackburn Reading Series has had the distinct pleasure of hosting: Robert Morgan, Lucille Clifton, Toby Olson, Lucy Corin, Paul Muldoon, William Gass, Heather McHugh, Sherman Alexie, Adrienne Rich, Alan Gurganus, Ann Beattie, James Salter, Mark Doty, Claudia Emerson, Angela Davis-Gardner, Robert Pinsky, Josephine Humphries, Jane Hirshfield, Howard Norma, Rachel Blau Duplessis, W.S. Merwin, William Corbett, Eileen Myles, Phillip Lopate, Lydia Davis, Jay Wright, Alice Notely, and George Sanders.