Springfield, Ohio - Wittenberg welcomes author Gish Jen for the second event in the 2015-16 Wittenberg Series. Jen will deliver the annual Allen J. Koppenhaver Literary Lecture at 7:30 p.m., Thursday, Sept. 17, in Bayley Auditorium, located in the Barbara Deer Kuss Science Center.
A contemporary American author, Jen has written four novels, a collection of short stories and a volume of lectures. She has been published in The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, and dozens of other periodicals and anthologies, including The Best American Short Stories of 1988, 1995 and 2013, as well as The Best American Short Stories of the Century, edited by John Updike.
Her most recent book, Tiger Writing: Art, Culture, and the Interdependent Self, explores the role of cultural difference in constructing the self. The book is based on the Massey Lectures in the History of American Civilization at Harvard University that Jen delivered in 2012. Widely taught, Jen’s work has been nominated for a National Book Critics’ Circle award and an International IMPAC Dublin Book award. Tiger Writing was also featured in a PBS American Masters’ special on the American novel.
In 2003, an American Academy of Arts and Letters jury comprised of Updike, Cynthia Ozick, Don DeLillo, and Joyce Carol Oates granted Jen a five-year Mildred and Harold Strauss Living award. Jen was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2009.
A Lannan Literary Award for Fiction, a Guggenheim fellowship, and a Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study fellowship are among the many honors Jen has received.
Before the lecture, Jen will participate in a colloquium at 4 p.m. in Bayley Auditorium.
Now in its 33rd year, the Wittenberg Series brings distinguished lecturers and performing artists of national and international prominence to the Wittenberg campus and Springfield community. The Ellen, Lloyd, Margaret and Lanty Smith Endowed Fund for Wittenberg sponsor this event. To make special arrangements, request a series poster, or become a friend of the Wittenberg Series, contact Nuggie Libecap at libecapn@uupt.net. All Wittenberg Series events are free and open to the public.
