草莓社区 (EMU) will host a March 29-April 1. The sixth in a series of Mennonite Writing conferences in the United States and Canada, the conference comes to the East Coast of the United States for the first time this spring.

鈥淚f you love to read or write, whether you鈥檙e Mennonite, MennoNot, or Menno-curious, this conference is for you,鈥� said conference co-chair , assistant professor of at EMU.

鈥淢ennonite/s Writing VI: Solos and Harmonies鈥� will feature a performance by Canadian Mennonite playwright Vern Thiessen and a reading and lecture by Charlottesville, Va., poet Greg Orr. A growing list of Mennonite scholars and writers, including Katherine Arnoldi, Stephen Raleigh Byler, Todd Davis, Dora Dueck, Jeff Gundy, Ann Hostetler, Jean Janzen, Julia Spicher Kasdorf, Keith Ratzlaff, Sofia Samatar, Hildi Froese Tiessen, and Rudy Wiebe will share their work.

Several events are open to the public, including a kick-off poetry reading followed by an orchestra concert on Thursday evening; a Friday night performance by Vern Thiessen of Back to Berlin, a funny and lyrical look at a father and son on a trip to Berlin to discover secrets lying in the city鈥攁nd in the father鈥檚 past; a lecture on 鈥淓thics, Aesthetics, and the Lyric鈥� by Charlottesville poet Gregory Orr Saturday morning, followed by a reading of his poetry. The conference will close with a Sunday morning meditation by Rudy Wiebe.

The festival program for conference registrants includes over seventy different presentations: readings, scholarly paper presentations, writing workshops, performances, book-signings, excursions and feasting. 鈥淥ur cup is full and running over when it comes to the program,鈥� said Beachy. 鈥淵ou can鈥檛 possibly see everything offered during the weekend, but you鈥檒l have a lot of great options. It鈥檚 a good reflection of the abundant and diverse voices coming out of Mennonite faith and culture.鈥�

The conference committee, co-chaired by Spicher Kasdorf, includes Mennonite writers and scholars from Bluffton, Goshen and EMU. Conrad Grebel University College (Waterloo, Ont.), co-sponsors the conference, and committee member of Conrad Grebel convened the first Mennonite writing conference there in 1990.

The conference is sponsored in part by the , the and the Marpeck Foundation.

For more information contact Kirsten Eve Beachy at kirsten.beachy@emu.edu. The full conference schedule and online registration can be found at .

Special rates are available for students and seniors.

Peterson will read from her works following dinner at 5:30 p.m., in Martin Chapel of the seminary building at 草莓社区. Several of the author’s books will be available for purchase. A book signing and short question and answer session with the author will follow the dinner.

“Lee Peterson’s poems are born out of a way of seeing that is honest and unflinching, that is always reaching out to others in a desire to understand, to walk with that person through pain or joy or hatred… and the possibility of a negotiated peace,” said , Writers Read featured author for September 2010.

Peterson teaches creative writing courses at Pennsylvania State University, Altoona campus, where she held the title of 2004 Emerging Writer-in-Residence. She is the author of “Rooms and Fields: Dramatic Monologues from the War in Bosnia,” winner of the 2003 Stan and Tom Wick Poetry Prize. In addition, Peterson led the 2007 Iowa Summer Writing Festival.

Her poetry has been published in the North American Review, Runes: A Review of Poetry, Nimrod: International Journal of Prose and Poetry and The Seattle Review.

Tickets and reservations

Reserve tickets online at or by calling the at 540-432-4168 before Feb. 17.

• General Admission $15
• EMU students with meal plan $5
• All other students $7

The language and literature department will hold its first “Writers Read” of the 2010-11 school year 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 30, in Martin Chapel of the Seminary building at EMU.

Award-winning author Todd Davis will read from his poetry focusing on the environment.

About Todd Davis

Davis teaches creative writing, environmental studies and American literature at Penn State University’s Altoona campus. He has written three books of poetry – The Least of These (Michigan State University Press, forthcoming), Some Heaven (Michigan State University Press, 2007) and Ripe (Bottom Dog Press, 2002) and is co-editor of Making Poems: 40 Poems with Commentary by the Poets (State University of New York Press, forthcoming).

His poems have been featured on the radio by Garrison Keillor, on “The Writer’s Almanac” and by Marion Roach on “The Naturalist’s Datebook” as well as by Ted Kooser in his syndicated newspaper column, “American Life in Poetry.”

Davis is a recipient of the Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry Prize, named for novelist-poet Gwendolyn Brooks (1917-2000), the first black author to win the Pulitzer Prize. She was poetry consultant to the Library of Congress and poet laureate of the State of Illinois.

Admission and other info

Sign language interpretation will be provided, a new feature this year.

Admission to the program, which includes dinner, is $15. Reservations are required and should be made by Friday, Sept. 24. Tickets may be reserved online or by calling the language and literature department at 540-432-4168.