UA’s Bankhead Visiting Writers Series Welcomes Pulitzer Prize Winning Author Jane Smiley to Bama Theatre

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – Jane Smiley is the author of 12 books, including “A Thousand Acres,” which won the 1992 Pulitzer Prize and was made into the 1991 movie starring Michelle Pfeiffer and Jessica Lange. She will read from her most recent book, “Good Faith” at the Bama Theatre on Oct. 21 at 7:30 p.m. as part of The University of Alabama’s Bankhead Visiting Writers Series.

“Good Faith,” published by Random House in April 2003, has received wide-spread acclaim. In this book Smiley brings her extraordinary gifts of comic timing and empathy to the world of real estate, where the sport of choice is the mind game. The novel is about what happens when the American dream morphs into a seven-figure American fantasy.

Smiley’s other works include “The Age of Grief,” “The Greenlanders,” “Ordinary Love and Good Will,” “Moo” and “Horse Heaven.” She also has written a biography on Charles Dickens as part of the Penguin Lives Series. Smiley’s essays have appeared in Vogue, The New Yorker, Harper’s Magazine, The Nation, and The New York Times Magazine, among others.

Between 1981 and 1996 she taught creative writing at Iowa State University in Ames. Today she lives in Northern California. In 2001, Smiley was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

In addition to Tuesday’s reading, Smiley will lead an informal question and answer session on Wednesday, Oct. 22, at noon in 301 Morgan Hall.

The Bankhead Visiting Writers Series is made possible by an endowment from the Bankhead Foundation, The University of Alabama’s program in creative writing, the department of English and the College of Arts and Sciences. For more information, contact UA’s creative writing program at 205/348-0766 or visit www.bama.ua.edu/~writing.