NEWS RELEASE

Office of External Communications

Houston, TX 77204-5017 Fax: 713.743.8199

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 11, 2006

Contact: Contact: Mike Emery
713.743.8186 (office)
713.415.6551 (pager)
pemery@uh.edu

PULITZER NOMINEE, VISITING AUTHOR FEATURED IN UH’S POETRY & PROSE


A Pulitzer Prize-nominated poet and a rising fiction writer will highlight the opening event for the University of Houston’s 2006 – 2007 Poetry & Prose readings.

Robert Phillips, John and Rebecca Moores Professor of English and John Weir, visiting creative writing professor, are the featured authors, who will read their works at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 13 in the Honors College Commons on the second level of UH’s M.D. Anderson Library. This event is open and free to the public. Complimentary refreshments will be served.

Phillips will read from his latest collection of poetry “Circumstances Beyond Our Control,” which is nominated for a 2007 Pulitzer Prize. He also will read several new poems.

“Often, when someone reads a poem off the page, he or she may interpret it differently than it was intended,” Phillips said. “Readings allow audiences to actually hear the poem delivered from the poet’s own voice.”

In addition to poetry, Phillips also has earned acclaim as a fiction writer and a critic. Among the many honors he has received are the award in Literature and Creative Writing from The American Academy of Arts and Letters, as well as the National Public Radio Fiction Prize.

John Weir, visiting creative writing professor, also will be on hand to read selections from latest book “What I Did Wrong,” which follows Tom, a gay professor, and his best friend from high school on a trip through Queens, New York. Throughout the daylong trek, Tom reflects on his past life in high school and his friendship with a novelist who died from AIDS.

Weir wrote a previous novel focusing on AIDS, “The Irreversible Life of Eddie Socket,” which received the Lambda Literary Award for Best First Novel. He also has written articles for magazine such as Spin and Rolling Stone.

WHAT: Poetry & Prose Reading Series
WHEN:

5:30 p.m., Wednesday, Sept. 13

WHERE: Honors College Commons
M.D. Anderson Library, Level 2
Entrance 1
WHO: University of Houston

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