Lannan Foundation

Christopher Hitchens

Christopher Hitchens’ books include The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice; For the Sake of Argument; and Blood, Class, and Nostalgia. With Edward Said, he has edited Blaming the Victims: Spurious Scholarship and The Question of Palestine. Mr. Hitchens received a Lannan Literary Award in 1991.

Christopher Hitchens Bio and Cross Links

John Edgar Wideman

John Hawkes

Barry Lopez

Mr. Lopez’s books include the nonfiction works Arctic Dreams, which won the National Book Award, Of Wolves and Men, and Crossing Open Ground; and the fiction collections Winter Count, Desert Notes, and Field Notes.

Asked to consider the role of the writer, Mr. Lopez has said, “I like to use the word isumatug. It’s of eastern Arctic Eskimo dialect and refers to the storyteller, meaning ‘the person who creates the atmosphere in which wisdom reveals itself.’ I think that’s the writer’s job. It’s not to be brilliant, or to be the person who always knows, but… to be the one who recognizes the patterns that remind us of our obligations and our dreams.”

The recipient of a Lannan Literary Award in Nonfiction, the American Book Award, and the John Burroughs Medal, among other honors, Mr. Lopez lives in rural Oregon. His residency lasted from August 20 to September 10, 1999.

Barry Lopez Bio and Cross Links

Peter Reading

Mr. Reading was born in Liverpool, England, in 1947 and studied painting at the Liverpool College of Art. He is one of the most inventive and challenging poets in England. His language is brilliantly original, compassionate, and laced with acid humor. Mr. Reading was the first writer to hold a one-year writing Lannan residency in Marfa, Texas. In June of 1999 Mr. Reading read from his work composed during his residency, as part of Readings & Conversations.

He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in his native England. Reading is one of Britain’s most controversial poets: angry, gruesomely ironic, hilarious, heartbreaking, and prolific. His work is experimental, playing with formal traditions of English in liberating ways, and he has produced a body of work that is frequently interrelated across book titles. His poetry has been collected into three volumes by Bloodaxe (UK) and critical assessments of his work have been written by Neil Roberts, Sean O’Brien, and Anthony Thwaite. “Anger is a country Peter Reading has been colonising for years. . .his anger is expressed with classical clarity. Rage against the state of the nation, yes, but also rage against the darkness of death, exile, and inability to show love.” – The Observer (London)

Peter Reading Bio and Cross Links

Wendell Berry

Wendell Berry is a poet, essayist, and novelist, who has been called the “prophet of rural America.” Mr. Berry, who pursues what he calls “an ethic and way of life based upon devotion to a place and devotion to a land,” lives and works on his farm in Port Royal, Kentucky.

He has published more than 30 books, including The Wheel, Sabbaths, and Openings (poetry); The Wild Birds, Watch with Me, and Remembering (fiction); and Another Turn of the Crank, What Are People For?, and The Unsettling of America (nonfiction).

He received a Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction in 1989.

Wendell Berry Bio and Cross Links

Cid Corman

Peter Levitt