Category Archives: Reed Campus Center

“I Didn’t Play Chess in Soviet Russia, Newsflash!”

“This day was not so much a surprise to those of us who knew her well,” said Peter Gunn as he introduced his former student, Jennifer duBois ’02, author of, A Partial History of Lost Causes and recently named one of the National Book Foundation’s Five Under 35.

It was a night of memories as duBois, who participated as a student in the Writers’ Workshop series, became the first alumna to also return as a guest author in the program.

As a student duBois studied The Odd Sea, written by Frederick Reiken, and was greatly influenced by something he said at her Writers’ Workshop.  She was having trouble grasping the truth in writing something she hadn’t experienced firsthand and Reiken said, “You write what you know, but you know more than you think you know.” Continue reading

Ali Moshiri Exhibits at Grubbs Gallery

Influences from Kandinsky, Miró, and Rothko can be seen in the colorful canvases that jump off the walls of the Grubbs Gallery, which now resembles a modern art gallery of the 1930s with Ali Moshiri’s Surrealist paintings.

Born in Iran, Moshiri was educated in the United States and England.  He returned to Iran for medical school, completed his residency in Cincinnati, and then began working at the Austen Riggs Center in Stockbridge, Massachusetts in 1984.  According to his website, as, “a young and untrained, but passionate, artist, Moshiri’s sketchbook was a constant companion in his spare time.”

Continue reading

Author Andre Dubus III Visits on October 11

The 14th Writers’ Workshop Series continues with author Andre Dubus III on October 11, 2011, at 7:00 p.m. in the Dodge Room of the Reed Campus Center.

Andre Dubus III is the author of a collection of short fiction, The Cage Keeper and Other Stories; the novels Bluesman, House of Sand and Fog, and The Garden of Last Days; and a memoir, Townie. Published in 20 languages and made into an Academy Award-nominated motion picture, House of Sand and Fog was a finalist for the National Book Award, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and Booksense Book of the Year. It was also an Oprah Book Club Selection and reached #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. Dubus has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, the National Magazine Award for fiction, and the Pushcart Prize. He is a member of PEN American Center, has served as a panelist for The National Book Foundation and The National Endowment for the Arts, and has taught at Harvard University, Tufts University, Emerson College, and the University of Massachusetts Lowell where he is a full-time faculty member.

Continue reading

Journalist Thomas French Completes Writers’ Series

thomas frenchThe 13th Writers’ Workshop Series ends with author and journalist Thomas French on November 30, 2010, 7:00 p.m. in the Dodge Room in the Reed Campus Center. Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Thomas French was a feature journalist for the St. Petersburg Times where he wrote seminal pieces such as ‘A Cry In The Night’, a story that “made a model for the rest of us to follow,” according to Washington Post reporter Anne Hull.

In 2009, his book Zoo Story was published. Based on six years of research, the book chronicles the inner world of Tampa’s Lowry Park Zoo by following a cast of animals through their adventures of captivity and addressing the moral complexities of zoo life. He has appeared on NPR’s “Talk of the Nation” and most recently on the “Colbert Report.” In 2008, French returned to his alma mater Indiana University where he has since served on the faculty of the Indiana University School of Journalism.

Continue reading

Debra Monroe to Read from “On the Outskirts of Normal”

news 7The Williston Northampton School’s Writers’ Workshop Series will host author Debra Monroe for a public presentation on Thursday, October 7, at 7:00 p.m. in the Dodge Room of the Reed Campus Center. This event is free and the public is welcome.

Declared “required reading” by Vanity Fair and picked by People Magazine and Salon.com, Monroe’s memoir On the Outskirts of Normal: Forging a Family Against the Grain tells an unsentimental story about a white woman who adopts a black baby in small town Texas. Published in June 2010, it has since been on the “Top 10 Books to Pick Up” in O: the Oprah Magazine.

Continue reading