Book Discussion: Reading the Signs of Our Times
Thursday, October 4, 7:00-8:30pm
This class is cancelled. Please watch the Wisdom Ways website for other program developments with the author.
"People who read like to untangle knots, to resolve complications," writes William Reichard. "People who read like puzzles that ask them to consider how each piece sits in relation to the next, and how the individual pieces relate to the whole."
In his recent anthology, American Tensions: Literature of Identity and the Search for Social Justice, Bill offers readers a generous and significant collection of fiction, poetry and essays inviting us to untangle some of the knots of identity and to consider how each of us sits in relation to all of us. Compiling the works of well known authors and emerging voices, the anthology gives witness to particular stories, especially those lived in the margins, while also directing our attention to truths and experiences that transcend the particular and time itself.
William will lead a discussion of three readings from this anthology, exploring the role of literature in the search for justice and considering the wide-ranging question of what constitutes family in our personal experiences and our society: "Shiloh," short story by Bobbie Ann Mason (pp. 24 - 35); "Under the Influence," essay by Scott Russell Sanders (pp. 156 - 167); and three poems by Philip Bryant (pp. 202 - 206). NOTE: The readings to be discussed are found in the anthology as noted above. Brief excerpts of these pieces are available here to offer a flavor of the works being discussed. If possible, please read the three pieces in full before the discussion, but if you haven't had a chance to read them and are still interested, come anyway! Books will be available for purchase the evening of the program and can be purchased at local bookstores.
Presenter: William Reichard is a writer, editor, and educator, and the author of four collections of poetry, most recently Sin Eater and This Brightness, both Minnesota Book Award finalists. In addition to American Tensions, Bill is also the editor of The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's: A Gay Life in the 1940s.
Facilitator: Karen Hering, Wisdoms Ways' Writer-in-Residence.
WHEN: Thursday, October 4, 7:00pm-8:30pm. NOTE: This class is cancelled.
COST: $10.00
