WILLIAM PATERSON UNIVERSITY TO HOLD ANNUAL WRITER’S CONFERENCE ON APRIL 5
—Nationally renowned author Russell Banks is featured speaker

Russell Banks, the award-winning American novelist, will be the keynote speaker at William Paterson University’s annual Spring Writer’s Conference on Saturday, April 5.

The event will be held from 9:30 to 6 p.m. in the Atrium on campus. It is cosponsored by the University’s English Department, the Alumni Association, and the New Jersey Council for the Humanities.

Exploring the theme "Family," the conference will feature morning and afternoon writing workshops led by William Paterson’s distinguished faculty and special guests. Topics include poetry, fiction, memoir, creative non-fiction, researching family history, mother-daughter relationships, critical writing, and family in Caribbean literature. The conference fee is $30 for a full day of participation, which includes lunch.

Banks is the author of more than a dozen novels and short story collections including "Affliction" and "The Sweet Hereafter," both of which were made into feature films. Other works include "Continental Drift," a finalist for the 1986 Pulitzer Prize, "Cloudsplitter," "The Angel on the Roof," "Trailerpark," and "Rule of the Bone." Banks has also contributed poems, stories and essays to The Boston Globe Magazine, Vanity Fair, The New York Times Book Review, Esquire, Harper's and many other publications.

He has won numerous awards and prizes for his work, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowships, the Ingram Merril Award, the St. Lawrence Award for Short Fiction, O. Henry and Best American Short Story Award, the John Dos Passos Award, and the Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. "Affliction" was short-listed for both the PEN/Faulkner Fiction Prize and the Irish International Prize. In early 2001, Banks was elected president of the International Parliament of Writers, following Wole Soyinka and Salman Rushdie. In 2002, he served as producer and screenwriter for the film adaptations of "Continental Drift" and "Rule of the Bone."

John Parras, a William Paterson associate professor of English, is coordinator of the conference. For additional information, contact Parras at 973-720-3067 or check the conference Web site at www.wpunj.edu/cohss/english/.
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3/13/03