English Department News and Events
Reading by Poet Betty Adcock Scheduled
Betty Adcock, Meredith's former poet in residence, will hold a poetry reading in Carswell Auditorium on Tuesday, March 20, 2007, at 7 pm. A book signing will follow in the lobby of Carswell. The public is welcome to attend.
Meredith College Hosts Reading by U.S., State Poets Laureate
By Betsy Rhame, ’01
The crowd gathered in Jones Chapel on March 21, 2006, heard about a wide variety of topics in a fairly short amount of time, including cancer, death of loved ones, landscapes, war, sandwiches and love between a mother and daughter.
According to Kathryn Stripling Byer, these topics were all appropriate to the occasion.
“Poetry reaches out to people in all kinds of ways,” explained Byer, North Carolina’s poet laureate. “It touches on issues that all of us think about and all of us care about.”
Byer joined United States Poet Laureate Ted Kooser for a poetry reading at Meredith College.
In her introduction of Kooser, Athena Garner, ’07, said, “The poet uses everyday language for everyday things….It is in these things he shows us one world at a time.”
Kooser said that he often writes about these ordinary things from a perspective that is removed from the subject matter.
“I write many poems of observance in which I don’t appear at all,” Kooser explained.
Kooser was named poet laureate of the United States in 2004 after writing verse since adolescence.
“I wanted desperately to be different and mysterious,” he said. “I seized upon poetry as a possibility. I’ve been thinking about poetry, either writing or thinking about it, for 50 years.”
Byer was appointed poet laureate of North Carolina in 2005.
After reading a poem with a line about falling into a compost pile, Byer said, “I think of being poet laureate as falling into a wonderful compost pile of voices…and seeing what grows out of it.”
The event was funded by the Mary Lynch Johnson Chair of English. Johnson was a Meredith alumna, a professor in the English department and the author of The History of Meredith College.
Author Frank McCourt Visits Meredith
By Betsy Rhame, ’01, and Melyssa Allen
Pulitzer Prize winning author Frank McCourt discussed his new book Teacher Man in Meredith College’s Jones Auditorium on Tuesday, Jan. 10, 2006.
When he came to the end of his 30-year teaching career he began to reflect on his life in the classroom. McCourt said he decided to write the book to tell the truth about what happens between teachers and students in the classroom. He wanted to describe the wide range of emotions that teachers feel, for example, “the exhilaration…when we all discovered some truth and the same time.”
“There are things going on in the classroom that only the teachers know about,” McCourt explained.
Though sometimes teaching was difficult, overall his job satisfaction was high.
“Maybe I could have done other things but I am glad I did this,” he remembered thinking.
McCourt received the Pulitzer Prize for Angela’s Ashes, and is also the recipient of the National Book Critics Circle Award, the American Booksellers Association ABBY Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Award.
This event was co-sponsored by Meredith College, Quail Ridge Books and Wake Education Partnership.
Author of “Reading Lolita in Tehran” Speaks at Convocation
By Betsy Rhame, ’01
Azar Nafisi thinks western literature is a means of seeing ordinary people in extraordinary ways, connecting with others and having insight into the way others live. These messages and others were discussed by Nafisi at the Mary Lynch Johnson Writers at Meredith series in honor of Founders’ Day on Monday, Feb. 28, 2005.
Nafisi, currently a visiting professor at Johns Hopkins University, published “Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books” in 2003. The book is a narrative of secret meetings she and seven female students had about the works of Nabokov, James, Austen, Flaubert and Fitzgerald. ”I wanted this to be the story of my students and my teaching,” she said.
During these meetings in protest of the oppression of the Iranian government, the women removed their veils, dissected the books of these forbidden authors and dreamed about freedom.
“You can never eliminate people’s aspirations for freedom,” Nafisi said and cautioned audience members about taking freedom for granted. “The world is very small and the lack of freedom in a country limits freedom in your own.”
Nafisi reflected on how she and her students pursued freedom within literature when Iranian officials continued to diminish women’s rights. Nafisi said, “Literature doesn’t save you from…jail, cancer (but) why is it when people have nothing left they turn to Flaubert?”
Associate Professor of English Robin Colby said, “Nafisi relies on stories to survive.”
Turning to literature was exactly what Nafisi and her students thought they had to do. The books she chose to discuss with her seven students were ones that featured strong, independent women. “At the heart of a British novel is a woman who says, ‘No…I make my own choice about my life.’”
Nafisi encouraged meaningful reading of literature. “Books need to be constantly read and reinterpreted,” she said. “The reward is you never see the world the way you saw it before.”
Though “Reading Lolita in Tehran” is enjoyed in countries throughout the world, Nafisi said the governments of China and Iran will not publish the book there. Despite the censorship, many Iranians have read her memoir since those who have smuggled the book into the country have photocopied it for others. “Censorship is the best publicity for the book,” Nafisi said.
Following the convocation audience members were invited to a book signing in the Johnson Hall rotunda and had the opportunity to meet Nafisi.
Canterbury Tales Recitation
On April 1, 2004, 300 Meredith faculty, students, alumnae and friends attempted a Guinness world record with a five-minute recitation/reading of The General Prologue of Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales. Guinness created this category just for us. Though we did not win, a large crowd that night enjoyed one of Meredith’s most well known traditions.
