Fiction writer Alexander Chee and four seniors in the Lewis Center for the Arts’ Program in Creative Writing at Princeton University will read from their work on Friday, February 26 at Labyrinth Books. The reading is part of the Emerging Writers Reading Series, which showcases senior thesis students of the Program in Creative Writing with established writers as special guests. Featuring student writers Martina Fouquet, Hannah Hirsh, Charlotte Maher Levy, and Maya Wahrman, the reading begins at 6:00 p.m. at the bookstore, 122 Nassau Street. The event is free and open to the public.
Photo by M. Sharkey
Alexander Chee is the author of the novels Edinburgh and The Queen of the Night, published earlier this month by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. The Queen of the Night has been included on best of 2016 preview lists for Wired, Travel + Leisure, Elle, Book Riot, Bookish, Bustle, BBC Books, Huffington Post Books, Brooklyn Mag, The Millions, Chicago Reader, Flavorwire, Kirkus Reviews, BOMB, Buzzfeed, and Entertainment Weekly. A Publishers’ Weekly review stated, “Chee’s lush and sweeping second novel uses a strikingly different setting from his accomplished debut, Edinburgh, but shares its musical themes and boldness… a moving meditation on the transformative power of fate, art, time, and sheer survival.” In an interview by Scott Simon of NPR’s Weekend Edition, he noted, “The Queen of the Night is sprawling, soaring, bawdy, and plotted like a fine embroidery.”
Chee is a recipient of a Whiting Writers’ Award and a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. His stories and essays have appeared in The New York Times Book Review, The New Republic, Tin House, Guernica, Slate, and on NPR, among others. He has taught fiction writing at the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop, the University of Texas at Austin’s New Writers Project, and Princeton University.
The four seniors, who are pursuing a certificate in Creative Writing in addition to their major areas of study, will read from their senior thesis projects. Each is currently working on a novel, a screenplay, translations, or a collection of poems or short stories as part of a creative thesis for their certificate. Thesis students in the Program in Creative Writing work closely with a member of the faculty, which includes Jeffrey Eugenides, Jhumpa Lahiri, Chang-rae Lee, Paul Muldoon, James Richardson, Tracy K. Smith, Susan Wheeler, Edmund White, and a number of distinguished lecturers.
The series, hosted by the seniors in the program, is intended to present a public showcase for the work of the thesis students and give the senior class the opportunity to read with and learn from established writers they admire.
