Pushcart Prize-winning fiction writer and National Book Foundation “5 under 35” honoree Dantiel W. Moniz, author of the Florida Book Award-winning short story collection Milk Blood Heat, will read from her work at 5:00 p.m. on February 6 in the Drapkin Studio at the Lewis Arts complex on the Princeton University campus. Beatrix Bondor, Noa Greenspan, Yunxia Hallowell, Amanda Kural, Sophie Lockwood, Alexis Maze, Luca Morante and Nimrah Naseer, seniors in Princeton’s Program in Creative Writing, will also read from their recent work. This event is part of the 2022-2023 C.K. Williams Reading Series, named after the late Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award-winning poet C.K. Williams, who served on Princeton’s faculty for 20 years. This series showcases senior students of the Program in Creative Writing alongside established writers as special guests. The event is free and open to the public, no tickets are required. The studio is an accessible venue, and guests in need of access accommodations are invited to contact the Lewis Center at LewisCenter@princeton.edu at least one week prior to the event date.
Dantiel W. Moniz. Photo Credit: Jason D. Moniz
Dantiel W. Moniz is also the recipient of a MacDowell Fellowship and the Alice Hoffman Prize for Fiction. Her debut short story collection, Milk Blood Heat, was a finalist for the PEN/Jean Stein Award, the PEN/ Robert W. Bingham Prize, and the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award, and it was longlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize. Kirkus Reviews notes that in Milk Blood Heat, “Each story vibrates with a thrumming undercurrent of primal power, found in both nature and in the most shadowy parts of ourselves…” and Ploughshares calls the story collection “vibrant and alive, full of energy and desire and with a sharp focus on the body.” Milk Blood Heat has been published in the U.K. and is forthcoming in Italy, Germany, and Poland. Her award-winning short story, “The Loss of Heaven,” is included in the 2022 Pushcart Prize anthology. Moniz’ other short works of fiction have appeared in The Paris Review, Harper’s Bazaar, American Short Fiction, Tin House, Yale Review and McSweeney’s among others. She teaches fiction classes as an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
The eight seniors who will read from their work are among 25 Princeton students pursuing certificates in creative writing in addition to their major areas of study. Each is currently working on a novel, a screenplay, translations, or a collection of poems or short stories as part of their creative independent work for the certificate. These students in the Program in Creative Writing work closely with a member of the faculty, which includes award-winning writers Michael Dickman, Aleksandar Hemon, A.M. Homes, Ilya Kaminsky, Yiyun Li, Paul Muldoon, Kirstin Valdez Quade, Susan Wheeler, and a number of distinguished lecturers and visiting professors.
All visitors to Princeton University are expected to be either fully vaccinated, have recently received and be prepared to show proof of a negative COVID test (via PCR within 72 hours or via rapid antigen within 8 hours of the scheduled visit), or agree to wear a face covering when indoors and around others.
The Drapkin Studio is an accessible venue. Guests in need of access accommodations are invited to contact the Lewis Center at LewisCenter@princeton.edu at least one week in advance of the event date.
Visit the Lewis Center website to learn more about the reading series, the Program in Creative Writing, and the more than 100 public performances, exhibitions, readings, screenings, concerts, and lectures presented each year by the Lewis Center for the Arts, most of them free.
