Spalding University’s Festival of Contemporary Writing, the state’s largest fall-spring reading series, will take place Saturday, Nov. 16, through Friday, November 22, with faculty and alumni of the low-residency programs of Spalding’s School of Creative and Professional Writing. Bestselling graphic novelist Gene Luen Yang headlines the festival as Distinguished Visiting Writer.

Yang is the author of the Printz Award-winning American Born Chinese and the National Book Award Finalist Boxers & Saints, a boxed set of graphic novels. Yang has served as a National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature and is the recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship.

Yang will deliver a public reading and discussion of Boxers & Saints at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, November 21, at the Egan Leadership Center’s Troutman Lectorium at Fourth and Breckenridge. A reception and book signing will follow. Students and teachers are particularly encouraged to attend this event.

Plenty of free parking is available for the campus readings. All readings and events are free, ticketless, and open to the public.

5:00 – 6:00 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 16. (Egan Leadership Center, 901 S. Fourth St.) The Anne and William Axton Series, in conjunction with the Louisville Literary Arts Writer’s Block Festival, presents award-winning novelist Garth Greenwell, author of What Belongs to You. Book signing will follow.

5 – 6 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 17. Faculty Reading. (Egan Leadership Center, 901 S. Fourth St.) Greetings by Kathleen Driskell.

Dianne Aprile (creative nonfiction), The Eye is Not Enough: On Seeing and Remembering
Douglas Manuel (poetry), Testify
Beth Ann Bauman (writing for children & young adults), Jersey Angel
Charlie Schulman (dramatic writing), Goldstein: A Musical About Family
Lynnell Edwards (poetry), Covet

5:30 – 6:45 p.m. Monday, Nov. 18. Celebration of Recently Published Books. Book signing to follow. (Egan Leadership Center, 901 S. Fourth St.) Introduction by Kathleen Driskell. Books provided by Follett.

K.L. Cook (fiction; creative nonfiction; poetry), Marrying Kind; The Art of Disobedience: Essays on Form, Fiction, and Influence; Lost Soliloquies
Helena Kriel (screenwriting), The Year of Facing Fire (a memoir)
Keith Wilson (poetry), Fieldnotes on Ordinary Love
Katy Yocom (fiction), Three Ways to Disappear

5:30 – 6:45 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 20. Faculty Reading. (Egan Leadership Center, 901 S. Fourth St.) Greetings by Lynnell Edwards.

Erin Keane (professional writing; poetry), Demolition of the Promised Land
Roy Hoffman (creative nonfiction; fiction), Alabama Afternoons: Profiles and Conversations; Come Landfall
Jason Howard (professional writing; creative nonfiction), A Few Honest Words: The Kentucky Roots of Popular Music
Maggie Smith (poetry), Good Bones
Silas House (fiction), Southernmost
Kathleen Driskell (poetry), Blue Etiquette

5:30 – 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 21. Distinguished Visiting Writer Gene Luen Yang discusses ‘Boxers & Saints.’ (Egan Leadership Center, 901 S. Fourth St.) Introduction by Kathleen Driskell. Book signing to follow. Books provided by Follett.

5:45 – 6:45 p.m. Friday, Nov. 22. Faculty Reading. (Citation Room, 1st fl., Brown Hotel, 335 W. Broadway)

John Pipkin (fiction), The Blind Astronomer’s Daughter
Kira Obolensky (playwriting), Hiding in the Open
Robin Lippincott (fiction; creative nonfiction), Unbroken Circle: Stories of Cultural Diversity in the South; Blue Territory
Rachel Harper (fiction), This Side of Providence
Bruce Romans (screenwriting), Executive Producer of Marvel’s The Punisher on Netflix and AMC’s Hell on Wheels

The reading schedule may change without notice. Check Facebook for updated information: Facebook.com/SpaldingSchoolofWriting. For more information, call 502-873-4400 or email [email protected].

About Spalding University’s School of Creative and Professional Writing: Spalding’s graduate creative writing school, Kentucky’s first school of writing, offers three low-residency programs, including the flagship 65-credit-hour MFA in Writing program; a 35-credit Master of Arts in Writing, offering tracks in creative writing and professional writing; and a 15-credit graduate certificate in writing, also with two tracks. The School of Writing offers concentrations in fiction; poetry; creative nonfiction; writing for children and young adults; writing for TV, screen, and stage; and professional writing. Students begin the semester in the spring, summer, or fall with a residency in Louisville or abroad, then return home for an independent study with a faculty mentor for the rest of the semester. Students may customize the location, season, and pace of their studies. See spalding.edu/schoolofwriting for more information, or find us on Twitter @SpaldingWriting.

With Commencement approaching on June 1, Spalding is publishing a series of stories and Q&A’s that highlight students from a range of degree programs who are set to graduate. Next up is Allison Campbell, who is earning the degree of Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. She is also a Student Media Ambassador and has contributed guest blogs for this site on her decision to transfer to Spalding, her thoughts on attending MFA in Writing lectures and her experience in the study-abroad trip to Ireland.

What is your favorite Spalding memory?
My favorite Spalding memory is taking a giant leap out of my comfort zone and studying abroad in Ireland with fellow Spalding students, faculty, and staff.

Which accomplishments are you most proud of during your time at Spalding?
During my time at Spalding, I am most proud of my completion of an internship with Louisville Literary Arts, pitching a novel to two literary agents whom I connected with through my internship, and writing stories that have helped me develop my writing craft.

What’s your favorite spot on campus?
My favorite spot on campus is the Mansion because it’s antique and creaky like out of an old movie.

At Spalding, we like to say that, “Today is a great day to change the world.” For many of our students, Commencement is a world changing experience. After graduation, how do you plan to change the world, big or small, and who inspires you to be a #spaldingworldchanger?
After graduation, I plan to change the world with my writing by telling stories that can help inspire people, make them laugh and make them feel like they aren’t alone. My brother, Sean Campbell, who works in financial aid at Spalding) inspires me to be a #spaldingworldchanger because he always does the right thing, loves to help other people and challenges me to be the best person I can be.

One privilege of being a student in Spalding’s Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program is that I can attend some of the lectures of the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program during its residencies. During the MFA fall residency, which took place Nov. 10-18, I attended two lectures.

The first was titled, “1798: Poetry’s Punk Moment: Lyrical Ballads With A Few Other Poems,” and was given by MFA program director Kathleen Driskell, who is an award-winning poet. The lecture was very relevant to me at the time because I was taking a Romanticism class during which we studied many of the poems that were mentioned in Driskell’s lecture. It was exciting for me to hear the information I learned as a BFA creative writing student being applied in an MFA lecture. Attending the lecture made me appreciate my BFA class even more because I could see the value of what I was learning. The “punk” aspect of the lecture was taken from a quote by a Guardian book reviewer and referred to the influential and liberal language used by poets William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge during the age of Romanticism. Wordsworth and Coleridge were essentially hippies or punks because of the way they looked at the world differently.

LEARN MORE | Spalding’s BFA in Creative Writing program

LEARN MORE | Spalding’s MFA in Creative Writing program

The second lecture I attended was, “What Happened to My Essay? How to Survive Writing for Magazines,” by Cathy Medwick. Medwick is former senior editor at Vogue and Vanity Fair, so she really knew what she was talking about. This lecture was very informative — I took a full page of notes. Even though I am fairly new to creative nonfiction and have not written very many essays that could be published, I found it valuable to hear how to deal with editors and the process of submission.

ALSO FROM ALLISON CAMPBELL | Why transferring to Spalding was the right choice for me

Being able to participate in the MFA residency was a great way to learn new information while being exposed to what an MFA program is really like. The experience made me want to go to grad school even more to further my education. I am always looking for ways to improve my writing, so I really appreciated this awesome opportunity.

Allison Campbell is a senior in Spalding’s Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program.

For much of my sophomore year of college, I was very unhappy. There were many reasons for this, one of them being that I was feeling unsatisfied by my college experience.

At the time, I was attending a different school. Even though I was involved in many campus activities — choir, voice lessons, German club, film club, the literary magazine and the school newspaper — I still felt like I didn’t belong there anymore. Plus, I wasn’t working, and I was constantly aware of the fact that I had very little money. I questioned whether it was worth all the debt I was accumulating.

Over the summer, my parents gave me an ultimatum: Get a job to help pay for school or transfer somewhere less expensive. I was having trouble finding a job due to the chronic pain that I had in my hands, wrists, and arms that made doing certain kinds of work much harder, so this put a lot of stress on me. Even though I was going to be paying for college mostly by myself, I knew they were right. I wasn’t in a position to go to a school as expensive as the one where I was, especially with my lack of satisfaction.

Because my family lived in Louisville, my parents suggested Spalding University, which had a creative writing program that interested me and where I had applied and been admitted out of high school. I was reluctant at first because I had many friends at my first college whom I didn’t want to leave, but my parents and I ended up going to speak to Spalding’s admissions staff.

The people at Spalding helped put my mind at ease and made the process of transferring so much easier than I had anticipated. I also liked the idea of Spalding’s six-week sessions, in which you focus on one or two classes at a time; that was very different than anything I had done before.

My ideal college was a small one with a good creative writing program, and Spalding met those requirements. I also was interested in studying abroad, and Spalding had a study-abroad program to Ireland— where I had wanted to go for a very long time. It was too good to be true.

I spoke with the director of the creative writing program, Dr. Merle Bachman, who made me feel comfortable about the classes I would be taking. I also liked that I’d be required to do an internship. I had always wanted to do one, and I thought it would be a good transition to the real world.

I also would be living on campus in the Spalding Suites, which were much nicer than the dorms I was used to.

In the end, I said yes to Spalding.

One year later, I have gone on the study-abroad trip to Ireland for two weeks, started an internship at Louisville Literary Arts, and I live closer to my family and my fiancé.

I am very happy with the decision I made, and I’m excited for the rest of my senior year.

Allison Campbell is a Spalding University senior majoring in creative writing.