Celebrated European Author's First-Ever U.S. Book Tour Comes to Washington College

Chestertown, MD — Washington College's 2008-2009 Sophie Kerr Lecture Series continues with a reading by Greek novelist Alexis Stamatis, touring the United States to celebrate the first U.S. publication of his work, at the Casey Academic Center Forum on Wednesday, September 17, at 4:30 p.m.

Stamatis is the author of 14 books—eight novels and novellas as well as six collections of poetry. He has represented Greece in various book festivals and seminars all over the world. He currently works as columnist for the Ethnos daily newspaper. He has worked as chief editor of foreign literature for the Metaixmio Publishing House in Greece, and as a journalist, literary critic and architect. In addition to the rest of his prodigious output, he has written the libretti for two musical pieces by the composer Theo Abazis.

In 2004 Stamatis participated in the world-famous International Writing Program of the University of Iowa through a Greek Fulbright Artists & Art-Scholars Award. In 2007 the American publishing house Etruscan Press won the First International Literary Award by the National Endowment of the Arts to publish Stamatis's novel American Fugue—his debut book release on this side of the Atlantic.

Stamatis's September 17 American Fugue reading at Washington College is part of a nationwide campus itinerary that also includes Harvard, Columbia, Cornell and other leading institutions.

The Sophie Kerr Lecture Series honors the legacy of the late Sophie Kerr, a writer from Denton, Md., whose generosity has enriched Washington College's literary culture. The 2008-2009 series includes poetry readings, fiction readings, lectures and, as its culmination in March 2009, a special appearance by two-time U.S. Poet Laureate Ted Kooser.

Admission to Stamatis's reading is free and open to the public. For more information, call 410/778-7879.

September 3, 2008

Sophie Kerr Winner Receives $135,000 Advance for First Book

Chestertown, MD, February 12, 2001 — Christine Lincoln '00, winner of the 2000 Sophie Kerr Prize, the largest undergraduate literary prize in the nation, has received a $135,000 advance from Pantheon, a division of Random House Publishers, for her first collection of short stories.

"I think they're superb," said literary agent Sara Chalfant of the Wylie Agency in New York concerning Lincoln's stories. "They're in the glorious tradition of Zora Neale Hurston, Toni Morrison and the early Alice walker. They are luminous."

Several publishing houses bid on Lincoln's collection, but she chose Pantheon because of editor Erroll McDonald.

"I felt like his vision of the book was closest to my vision," Lincoln said. "He said, 'You're an African American woman, this is your voice.'"

The collection will include stories that Lincoln submitted last year to the Sophie Kerr Committee as well as others written after graduation. The book is slated for a fall 2001 release.