Beck Series

The Beck Series provides students the opportunity to hear, study with, and engage some of this country’s finest writers.

Beck Series Coordinator:
Margot Singer

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About the Beck Series

For over fifty years the Beck Series, funded by the Harriet Ewens Beck Endowment for English, has been a mainstay of creative writing studies at Denison University. The series provides students the opportunity to hear, study with, and engage some this country’s finest writers in the close quarters and pastoral setting of our hilltop campus in Granville, Ohio.

Here are just a few notable speakers from past years:

  • Eudora Welty — Pulitzer Prize winner for “The Optimist’s Daughter”
  • Alice Walker — Pulitzer Prize & National Book Award winner; author of “The Color Purple ”
  • Tom Stoppard — Playwright & Oscar-winning screenwriter for “Shakespeare in Love”
  • W.S. Merwin — Pulitzer Prize for Poetry winner & United States Poet Laureate
Beck Series guest, GLCA fiction award winner Lesley Nneka Arimah speaks
Beck Series guest, GLCA fiction award winner Lesley Nneka Arimah
Beck Series guest, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Philip Levine
Beck Series guest, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Philip Levine
Beck Series guests, prize-winning poets Maggie Glover '05 and Page Starzinger
Beck Series guests, prize-winning poets Maggie Glover '05 and Page Starzinger

Harriet Ewens Beck, class of 1910, developed a lifelong love of poetry after studying high school English with Willa Cather in Pittsburgh. Upon her passing, her husband Gordon C. Beck (class of 1906), arrived on campus in 1960 and announced to Paul Bennett of the English Department, “I want to establish an enduring monument to Harriet, something that will honor her interest in writing.” Beck pledged to fund the endowment and then, over a lunch of peanut butter crackers and chocolate chip cookies in the Student Union, the two men outlined the plans of what would become one of most vibrant and dynamic reading series on any campus in this country.

The Beck Series first visitor was Eudora Welty, whose four-day visit came in April of 1964. She met with faculty, visited classes, and conferenced with students about their manuscripts. That first visit set the tone and template that defines the Beck Series. Visitors to Denison’s campus continue to share their work in public readings, meet with creative writing classes and the campus community, and work with students in one-on-one manuscript consultations or lead workshops. 

The generous gift from the Beck family has brought to Denison twelve United States’ Poet Laureates and over twenty winners of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, including Derek Walcott, Louise Erdrich, Mark Strand, Aleksander Hemon, Steven Millhauser, and Edwidge Danticat, to name a few.

 

“The Beck Series has been one of Denison’s jewels, a virtual anthology of American writing since 1960. New, emerging, established, and downright famous writers in every literary genre, from short poems to long novels, political, lyrical, confessional — every literary stance has been represented by our visitors.”

David Baker, Thomas B. Fordham Chair of Creative Writing

Beck Series
Archives

2014 - 2015

Photo of author Ted Conover
Author Ted Conover

The Beck Series welcomes author Ted Conover.

anne barngrover
Poet Anne Barngrover '08

The Beck Series welcomes poet Anne Barngrover '08.

Photo of author Dinah Lenney
Author Dinah Lenney

The Beck Series welcomes author Dinah Lenney.

Randa Jarrar
'Mapping Home'

The Laura C. Harris Series and the Beck Series welcome author Randa Jarrar presenting a lecture, "Mapping Home."

Creative writing faculty and their work
Creative writing faculty and their work

The Beck Series welcomes creative writing faculty David Baker, Peter Grandbois and Margot Singer as they present their work.

Photo of fiction writer Sharon Bridgforth
Author Sharon Bridgforth

The Black Studies Program and the Beck Series welcome fiction writer Sharon Bridgforth.

Photo of essayist, fiction writer and GLCA prize winner E.J. Levy
Author E.J. Levy

The Beck Series welcomes essayist, fiction writer and GLCA prize winner E.J. Levy.

Photo of poet and GLCA prize-winner Natalie Shapero
Natalie Shapero

The Beck Series welcomes poet and GLCA prize-winner Natalie Shapero.

Photo of poet Jamaal May
Poet Jamaal May

The Beck Series welcomes poet Jamaal May.

Photo of author Karen Joy Fowler
Author Karen Joy Fowler

The Beck Series welcomes author Karen Joy Fowler.

Photo of essayist and fiction writer Andrew Lam
Essayist Andrew Lam

The Beck Series welcomes essayist and fiction writer Andrew Lam.

2013 - 2014

Mary Ruefle
Poet Mary Ruefle

The Beck Series welcomes poet Mary Ruefle.

Photo of essayist and fiction author Brian Doyle
Extraordinary essayist

The Beck Series welcomes essayist and fiction author Brian Doyle.

Photo of Ismet Prcic, the 2013 GLCA prize-winning author for fiction
Award-winning fiction author

The Beck Series welcomes Ismet Prcic, the 2013 GLCA prize-winning author for fiction.

Photo of Maggie Glover '05 and Page Starzinger
Prize-winning poets

The Beck Series welcomes Maggie Glover '05 and Page Starzinger as they read from their poetry.

Photo of Maggie Glover '05 and Page Hill Starzinger
Talking with authors

The Beck Series presents a talk with authors Maggie Glover '05 and Page Hill Starzinger.

Benjamin Busch
Benjamin Busch, GLCA Prize Winner for Creative Nonfiction

The Beck Series welcomes Benjamin Busch, GLCA Prize Winner for Creative Nonfiction.

Alison Bechdel
The life and art of Alison Bechdel

The Beck Series and Queer Studies Program welcome Alison Bechdel.

Photo of Stephen Graham Jones
Novelist Stephen Graham Jones

The Beck Series welcomes Stephen Graham Jones.

Photo of poet Dana Levin
Poet Dana Levin

The Beck Series welcomes poet Dana Levin.

Photo of Philip Levine
Poet Philip Levine

The Beck Series welcomes Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Philip Levine

Pam Houston '83
Fiction Writer—winner of the 1993 Western States Book Award

2012 - 2013

David Shields
Nonfiction Writer—David Shields is the author of fourteen books
Kwame Dawes
He is a writer of poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and plays.
Alan Heathcock
Fiction Prize Winner—Alan Heathcock’s fiction has been published in many of America’s top magazines and journals.
David Ebenbach
Fiction Writer and author of two books of short stories—"Between Camelots" (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2005) and "Into the Wilderness".
Lee Smith
Fiction Writer—Her novel "The Last Girls" was a 2002 New York Times bestseller as well as winner of the Southern Book Critics Circle Award
G.C. Waldrep
G.C. Waldrep, Bucknell professor, speaks on his writing and poetry.
Carl Phillips
Poet—author of 12 books of poetry
Edwidge Danticat
Fiction Writer—Her work has appeared in The New Yorker and many anthologies.

2011 - 2012

Jerry Ward
Jerry Ward is a poet, scholar, and author, and is professor of English and African American World Studies at Dillard University in New Orleans.
C.K. Williams
Winner of national acclaim and awards for his poetry, CK Williams will be sharing his poetry for for Beck Lecture Series.
Modhumita Roy
Modhumita Roy is associate professor of English and director of the Women’s Studies program at Tufts University.
Nick Lantz
Poetry Prize Winner—Lantz has won the 2011 GLCA New Writers Award, the Council for Wisconsin Writers Posner Award, and the Larry Levis Reading Prize
Michael Griffith
Fiction Writer—Griffith’s new novel, "Trophy" (Triquarterly), was named one of Kirkus Reviews’ Best 25 Books of Fiction for 2011
Peter Grandbois
Peter Grandbois is the author of the novel "The Gravedigger".
Gretel Ehrlich
Gretel Ehrlich is the author of thirteen books, including three books of narrative essays, a novel, a memoir, three books of poetry, a biography, a book of ethnology/travel, and a children’s book, among others.
Debra Allbery
Poet Debra Allbery is the Director of the Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers.
Derek Mong '04
Derek Mong was the 2008-2010 Axton Fellow in Poetry at the University of Louisville, where he taught literature, creative writing, and hosted “The Soul That Grows in Darkness: The Axton Festival of Film and Verse.”
Goldie Goldbloom
Born in Western Australia, GLCA award-winning novelist and short story writer Goldie Goldbloomnow lives in Chicago with her eight children and a cat.

2010 - 2011

Laura Munson '88
Laura Munson '88 is the author of The New York Times and international bestselling memoir, "This Is Not The Story You Think It Is: A Season of Unlikely Happiness" (Amy Einhorn Books/Putnam 2010), which Book of the Month Club named one of the best books of 2010.
Ernesto Cardenal
Ernesto Cardenal - Twice Nobel Prize nominated author of more than thirty-five books, the Nicaraguan writer, priest, and activist, Ernesto Cardenal has always considered poetry as a powerful agent for constructive social change.
Marjory Welish
Marjorie Welish, an artist, poet, painter and critic, received her M.F.A. degree from Vermont College, Norwich University.
Aleksandar Hemon
Aleksandar Hemon was born in 1964 in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina.
MIchael Collier
Michael Collier has published five books of poems: "The Clasp and Other Poems"; "The Folded Heart"; "The Neighbor"; "The Ledge", a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize; and most recently, Dark Wild Realm.
Josh Weil
Josh Weil was born in the Blue Ridge Mountains of rural Virginia to which he returned to write the novellas in his first book, "The New Valley" (Grove, 2009).

2009 - 2010

Michael Pollan
Michael Pollan is the author of "In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto", winner of the James Beard Award, and "The Omnivore's Dilemma", which was named one of the ten best books of the year by both the New York Times and the Washington Post.
Lisa Suhair Majaj
Lisa Suhair Majaj is a Palestinian-American poet and scholar.
Katy Lederer
Poet Katy Lederer will read from her recent work.
Katy Lederer & Martha Moody
Novelist Martha Moody and poet Katy Lederer will participate in a panel discussion on writing and other careers.
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