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Joni Tevis, the 2007-2008 Kenan Visiting Writer at UNC, will give a free public reading Nov. 8 at 3:30 p.m. in Donovan Lounge (Room 223) of Greenlaw Hall.

Tevis is teaching classes during her yearlong residency in the creative writing program in the department of English and comparative literature. The Kenan Writer position is funded by the Spray Foundation of Atlanta and by UNC’s College of Arts and Sciences.

Tevis wrote “The Wet Collection” (Milkweed Editions, July 2007), a book of lyric essays exploring intersections among natural history, ancient texts, American history, family myths, folk heroes and found objects.

After receiving a 2006 Minnesota State Arts Board grant to further her research on Herman Melville and Woodrow Wilson, Tevis became interested in the characters, often nameless, who rate a mention in primary texts such as diaries, ship logs and medical records, but about whom little more is known.

Her current project casts light on the possible lives of people such as Melville’s shipmates on the whaler Acushnet, as well as the farmers and factory workers who lined the streets of Minneapolis and San Francisco during Wilson’s ill-fated Western speaking tour of 1919.

Tevis received doctoral and master’s of fine arts degrees from the University of Houston and a bachelor’s degree from Florida State University.

In 2006, Tevis’ work was nominated for the Pushcart Prize in nonfiction. The literary prize honors the best poems, essays and short stories published by small presses. Her poems and essays have appeared in literary publications including Shenandoah, Southern Humanities Review, The Southeast Review and the Bellingham Review.

Photo of Tevis: http://www.unc.edu/news/pics/releases/trevis_joni.JPG

College of Arts and Sciences contact: Kim Spurr, (919) 962-4093, This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it