The Mountain Heritage Literary Festival
June 15-17, 2012
2012 Staff
KEYNOTE ADDRESS. Ron Rash delivered MHLF’s inaugural keynote address. He returns to Lincoln Memorial University with even more accolades under his belt. Born in 1953 in Chester, South Carolina, Ron grew up in Boiling Springs, North Carolina. He is a graduate of Gardner-Webb University and Clemson University. He holds the John Parris Chair in Appalachian Studies at Western Carolina University. In 2012, his short story collection Burning Bright received the Frank O’Connor Short Story Award. Most recently, Ron has published a new volume of poetry Waking in 2011. His newest novel The Cove will be released in April 2012. With each new book, Rash has confirmed his position as a central and significant Appalachian writer.
KEYNOTE MUSICIAN. To be announced.
FICTION MASTER CLASS. Joseph Bathanti is the author of six books of poetry: Restoring Sacred Art (winner of the 2010 Roanoke Chowan Prize), Communion Partners, Anson County, The Feast of All Saints, This Metal and Land of Amnesia. His novel East Liberty won the 2001 Carolina Novel Award. His latest novel Coventry won the 2006 Novello Literary Award. His book of stories The High Heart won the 2006 Spokane Prize. Bathanti is the recipient of Literature Fellowships from the North Carolina Arts Council in both poetry and fiction. He and his work have also been acknowledged numerous times including the Sherwood Anderson Award, the Barbara Mandigo Kelly Peace Poetry Prize and others. He was recently named the Gilbert-Chappell Distinguished Poet for the Western Region for the North Carolina Poetry Society for 2011-12. He has taught at Appalachian State University (ASU) since 2001. This year Bathanti was named writer-in-residence of Watauga Global Community, a unit within ASU, where he will establish and direct a site-based writing initiative focused on creative nonfiction.
NONFICTION MASTER CLASS. Jim Minick has lived all of his life in the Appalachian Mountains. He grew up in the small town of Newburg, Pennsylvania, and eventually wound up in Radford, Virginia, where he teaches at Radford University. His work has appeared in many publications including Shenandoah, Orion, San Francisco Chronicle, Encyclopedia of Appalachia, Conversations with Wendell Berry, The Sun, Appalachian Journal, Bay Journal News, and Wind, and for thirteen years, he wrote a monthly column for The Roanoke Times New River Current. His love for the mountains is evident in his writing, especially in Finding a Clear Path, a collection of naturalist essays. He has also published two collections of poetry, Her Secret Song and Burning Heaven. Most recently, Minick authored The Blueberry Years. The story captures his personal experience creating, operating, and eventually selling one of the mid-Atlantic’s first certified-organic, pick-your-own blueberry farms.
POETRY MASTER CLASS. Michael Chitwood was born and raised in the foothills of the Virginia Blue Ridge. He graduated from Emory and Henry College in Southwest Virginia, and later he earned the Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of Virginia. His poetry and fiction have appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, Poetry, The New Republic, and numerous other journals. He is a regular commentator for radio station WUNC-FM. Ohio Review Books published Chitwood’s first two books of his poetry: Salt Works (1992) and Whet (1995). His third book, The Weave Room, was published in 1998, as well as his collection of essays Hitting Below the Bible Belt. Gospel Road Going, a collection of poems about his native Appalachia, was published in 2002. In 2006, he published a collection of essays and short stories called Finishing Touches. Another collection of poetry From Whence was released in March 2007 from Louisiana State University Press, and in the same year, Tupelo Press published his book Spill. Spill was named as a finalist for ForeWard magazine’s poetry book of the year and won the 2008 Roanoke-Chowan Prize. His most recent collection is Poor-Mouth Jubilee, released in 2010.
WRITING FOR THE STAGE MASTER CLASS. Lisa Soland graduated from Florida State University with a BFA in acting and received her Equity card working as an apprentice at the Burt Reynolds Jupiter Theatre. After moving to Los Angeles, she wrote her first play The Name Game subsequently published by Samuel French, along with Waiting, Cabo San Lucas, Truth Be Told and The Man in the Gray Suit & Other Short Plays. With over 30 publications in all, her plays and portions of her works are also included in ―best of‖ anthologies by the leading play publishers including French, Smith & Kraus, Dramatic Publishing and Applause Books. Lisa had the opportunity to return to her alma mater Florida State University to lead the MFA Playwriting Program as a guest professor. She has produced and/or directed over 80 theatrical productions and continues to lead playwright workshops, helping to inspire countless original play readings and productions across the country. She just completed a playwright-in-residence for Tennessee Repertory Theatre, writing her new play "The Hand on the Plough" under the mentorship of John Patrick Shanley.
SPECIAL MUSICAL GUEST. Sue Massek is a founding member and banjo-player for the Reel World String Band. Her writing and activism have been heavily influenced by her experiences at the Highlander Center, where she met and learned from activists like Rosa Parks and Pete Seeger. With the Reel World String Band, Sue has toured the USA, Canada, and Italy and just finished their sixth recording project, "Coast is Clear." Her solo work has taken her to Guatemala and Nicaragua, but more often she is in Kentucky schools teaching diversity, disguised as folk music and dance. Sue's love for nature is a driving force in her life and many of her songs reflect her passion for protecting our environment. Her songs have been featured in films and plays.
STAGE PERFORMANCE. Barbara Bates Smith returns to the MHLF with her new production based on Ron Rash’s short story Lincolnites. A Southeastern Theatre Conference ‘Best Actress’ award winner, Bates has enjoyed featured roles in numerous regional productions including "Hamlet," "Doubt," "Driving Miss Daisy" and Beckett's "Happy Days." At Florida’s Asolo Theatre, she was in the world premiere of Horton Foote's "Talking Pictures." Know particularly for her performance of "Ivy Rowe" from Lee Smith's Fair and Tender Ladies, Bates has adapted numerous works of literature for the stage, and she has written and performed her own original work. Barbara and her husband Russell live in the mountains near Clyde, North Carolina. Musician Jeff Sebens accompanies Bates on stage.
WRITER-IN-RESIDENCE. Pam Duncan was born in Asheville and grew up in Black Mountain, Swannanoa, and Shelby, North Carolina. She holds a B.A. in journalism from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an M.A. in English and Creative Writing from North Carolina State University in Raleigh. She lives in Cullowhee, North Carolina, and teaches creative writing at Western Carolina University. Her first novel Moon Women was a Southeastern Booksellers Association (now Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance) Award Finalist, and her second novel Plant Life won the 2003 Sir Walter Raleigh Award for Fiction. She is the recipient of the 2007 James Still Award for Writing about the Appalachian South, awarded by the Fellowship of Southern Writers. Her third novel The Big Beautiful was published in 2007.
CO-DIRECTOR. Darnell Arnoult’s first book What Travels With Us: Poems was published in 2005. The collection received the 2005 Weatherford Award, was named 2006 Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance Poetry Book of the Year and was a finalist for Appalachian Poetry Book of the Year in 2005. A novel Sufficient Grace followed in 2006. Sufficient Grace received a starred review in Publisher’s Weekly and positive reviews from Book List, Kirkus, American Library Association and National Association of the Mentally Ill. It was selected for the Book Sense annual reading group list and nominated for several regional awards. Additionally, Arnoult was honored as Tennessee Writer of the Year by the Tennessee Writers Alliance in 2007 and was awarded the Mary Frances Hobson Prize in Arts and Letters from Chowan University in 2009. Arnoult was born in Martinsville, Va., and then lived and worked in North Carolina for 20 years before moving to Tennessee in 1999. She holds the MFA from the University of Memphis, where she held a Moss Fellowship and served as Senior Fiction Editor for the program’s award-winning literary journal The Pinch.
CO-DIRECTOR. Denton Loving’s fiction, poetry, essays and reviews have appeared or are forthcoming in more than 30 magazines and journals including Birmingham Arts Journal, Appalachian Heritage, Minnetonka Review, and Main Street Rag, as well as in numerous anthologies including Degrees of Elevation: Stories of Contemporary Appalachia. In 2010, he received a summer writing fellowship from the Collegeville Institute for Ecumenical and Cultural Research. This winter, his work was selected by Margaret Atwood for her workshop in the Key West Literary Seminars. He serves as director of prospect research at Lincoln Memorial University and lives in Speedwell, Tennessee.
University Advancement
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Phone:
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