Award-winning author Mat Johnson is keynote speaker for Big Read

Daniel A. Reed Library at SUNY Fredonia, in cooperation with the Chautauqua Region Community Foundation, the Chautauqua-Cattaraugus Library System and the National Endowment for the Arts, is pleased to announce that the poetry and short stories of Edgar Allan Poe has been selected for this year's Big Read. To help celebrate Poe’s literary works, award-winning, contemporary author Mat Johnson will be the keynote speaker for this year’s program.

Johnson, a faculty member at the University of Houston Creative Writing Program, was named the first USA James Baldwin Fellow by the United States Artists Foundation in 2007 and was recently awarded the 2011 John Dos Passos Prize for Literature.

While much of Johnson’s writing is about the lives of African-Americans across literary genres including novels Hunting in Harlem (2003); Drop (2000); a nonfiction novella The Great Negro Plot (2007); and graphic novels Dark Rain (2010) and Incognegro (2008.)  His latest work, PYM (2011) turns Poe’s; The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket on its head cap with the discovery of a manuscript that suggests Poe’s story is more fact than fiction. The revelation sends a disgruntled professor off on an improbable odyssey to find the island near Antarctica described by Poe.

Johnson will present “Pym Poe’s Gauntlet” at the 1891 Fredonia Opera House on Thursday, Oct. 27 from 7:30 to 9 p.m. The event is free however a canned food donation is suggested to the Salvation Army Food Pantry in Dunkirk. Opera House doors open at 7 p.m. Johnson will also be giving a craft talk on campus at 4 p.m.,
in McEwen 202.

In preparation for Johnson’s keynote address, Reed reference librarian Scott Richmond will facilitate a discussion entitled Poe, Pym and Beyond: A Modern Obsession on Wednesday, Oct. 12 starting at 6:30 p.m. at the Buster Brown Bean Company Café and Bistro, 33 Church St., in Fredonia.  Copies of The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym and Johnson's spin-off,  Pym: Novel are available for purchase at The Book Nook. The public is encouraged to attend this event, even if you haven’t had the opportunity to review both novels ahead of time.

There are many great events going on at public libraries and other community venues throughout the Chautauqua-Cattaraugus region during the month of October. To check out the full calendar of events,  http://www.fredonia.edu/bigread/. You can also join us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/groups/BigReadFredonia/.

The Big Read is an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) designed to restore reading to the center of American culture. The NEA presents The Big Read in partnership with the Institute of Museum and Library Services and in cooperation with Arts Midwest.