Among the hundreds of writers Wells has hosted over the years, many have been top figures in their field who have won such prestigious awards as the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award, and their works regularly appear on "best of the year" lists by the New York Times, National Public Radio and other prestigious media outlets. One visiting author (the Russian poet Joseph Brodsky) was even a Nobel Prize winner! Yet, the Visiting Writers Series selects only those writers who can bring something special to the close-knit Wells community, which has had its continuously growing share of ambitious and committed undergraduate writers.
Visiting writers are frequently editors and publishers, or are involved in graduate writing programs, and all have wide publishing experience, so they can help students learn about practical matters relating to the literary scene and publishing, in addition to providing hands-on advice and criticism. Sometimes there are group readings by editors and writers representing journals, such as the Healing Muse or Stone Canoe, or by publishers such as Michael Czarnecki of FootHills Publishing, enabling students to gain exposure to the vital work being done all over the country by small presses and literary magazines.
facebook.com/WellsVisitingWriters/
The Visiting Writers Series is supported by Wells College, the New York State Council on the Arts, the Virginia Kent Cummins Fund (for poets), the Mildred Walker Fund (for fiction writers), and gifts from the College's alumnae, alumni and other friends and supporters.
The Wells College English Department is thrilled to welcome these writers to campus virtually and in person. Masks and adherence to all College public health guidelines are required for in-person events. Visit wells.edu/covid-19-info for more details.
Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022
MASTER CLASS: "Snakes, Styrofoam, and Sugar Maples: Writing Our Environment"—5:00 p.m., Faculty Parlors, Main Building
READING—7:30 p.m., Art Exhibit Room, Macmillan Hall
Madeline ffitch writes and organizes in Appalachian Ohio. She was a founding member of the punk theater company, the Missoula Oblongata, and is the author of the story collection, Valparaiso, Round the Horn. Madeline has been awarded residencies at Yaddo and at the MacDowell Colony. She is also the author of the novel Stay and Fight from Farrar, Straus and Giroux—a finalist for the PEN Hemingway Award, the Lambda Literary Award, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the Washington State Book Award. This event is co-sponsored with the Wells College Center for Sustainability and the Environment.
Thursday, March 10, 2022
MASTER CLASS—5:00 p.m., Faculty Parlors, Main Building
READING—7:30 p.m., Art Exhibit Room, Macmillan Hall
G’Ra Asim, a writer and musician, is an assistant professor of creative writing at Washington University in St. Louis. His nonfiction debut, Boyz n the Void: a mixtape to my brother, was released in May 2021 via Beacon Press. He has served as a writing director at the African American Policy Forum and a graduate teaching fellow in Columbia University’s Undergraduate Writing Program. His work has appeared in Slate, Salon, Guernica, the Baffler, and the New Republic. When not writing prose or teaching, he sings, plays bass, and writes lyrics for DIY pop punk quintet, babygotbacktalk.
Wednesday, April 20, 2022
VIRTUAL MASTER CLASS—5:00 p.m. Zoom (click here for Zoom link)
VIRTUAL READING—7:30pm, Zoom (click here for Zoom link)
Ryka Aoki (she/her) is a poet, composer, teacher, and novelist whose books include Light from Uncommon Stars, He Mele a Hilo and two Lambda Award finalists, Seasonal Velocities and Why Dust Shall Never Settle Upon This Soul. Ryka’s work has appeared or been recognized in publications including Vogue, Elle, Bustle, Autostraddle, PopSugar, and Buzzfeed. Her poetry was featured at the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center, and she was honored by the California State Senate for “extraordinary commitment to the visibility and well-being of Transgender people.” This event is co-sponsored with the program in Women's, Transgender, and Queer Studies.
Thursday, April 28, 2022
MASTER CLASS: “The Personal Political”—5:00 p.m., Faculty Parlors, Main Building
READING—7:30 p.m., Art Exhibit Room, Macmillan Hall
Jaswinder Bolina is the author of three collections of poetry—Carrier Wave, Phantom Camera, and The 44th of July, which was long-listed for the 2019 PEN America Open Book Award and a finalist for the 2019 Big Other Book Award. He has also published a collection of essays, Of Color, with McSweeney’s. His individual poems and essays have appeared in the Best American Poetry series, the Norton Reader, on the Poetry Foundation website, and have been featured in many other literary journals and anthologies. He is on the faculty of the M.F.A. program in creative writing at the University of Miami.
For each visiting writer, the Book Arts Center and Press collaborates with Wells' English department to prepare a handmade broadside of the writer's work. View previous broadsides available for purchase here.
