Purchase College Presents Acclaimed Novelists

Purchase College-SUNY will present A Reading and Conversation with Alexander Chee and Garth Greenwell on Thursday, October 27 at 4:30 p.m. The program, which is free of charge and open to the public, will take place in the Library at Purchase College (735 Anderson Hill Road, Purchase, NY). Featuring two of today’s most exciting novelists, the event is part of the Durst Distinguished Lecture Series, which brings leading writers to the Westchester community.

Alexander Chee is the author of two novels: Edinburgh (2001), which won the Lambda Editor’s Choice Prize and the Asian American Writers Workshop Literature Award, and the recently published The Queen of the Night (2016). A graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Chee is the winner of a 2003 Whiting Award and a 2004 NEA Fellowship in prose and a 2010 MCCA Fellowship.

Garth Greenwell is a graduate of Purchase College-SUNY and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. His first novel, What Belongs to You, was published in 2016 by Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, and was longlisted for the 2016 National Book Award in Fiction. He lives in Iowa City, where he holds the Richard E. Guthrie Memorial Fellowship at the University of Iowa.

“Garth Greenwell and Alexander Chee are both brilliant stylists; their prose is intelligent, seductive, lucid, visionary. And both writers honestly explore desire, especially queer desire, in its many and complex forms,” says Anthony Domestico, assistant professor of literature at Purchase College. “We are particularly excited to welcome Garth, a Purchase alum, back to campus.”

Gaura Narayan, an assistant professor of literature at the college, comments, “Purchase College is delighted to celebrate Garth Greenwell and Alexander Chee. We are thrilled to welcome home Garth, who was one of our more distinguished students during his undergraduate years.”

For more information on the event, please visit http://news.purchase.edu/oct-27-alexander-chee-and-garth-greenwell-readings-and-conversations/ or call 914.251.6550.

The Durst Distinguished Lecture Series and the Roy and Shirley Durst Distinguished Chair in Literature are funded by the Roy and Shirley Durst Distinguished Chair in Literature Endowment. The mission of the Durst programs is to infuse the experience and intellect of leading writers into the Purchase community, while providing diverse opportunities for these writers to interact with students and influence campus life.

Poet Claudia Rankine—who was recently named a fellow of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and recipient of the MacArthur “Genius” award—is Purchase College’s 2016-17 Roy and Shirley Durst Distinguished Chair in Literature. In this position, Rankine will lead numerous programs throughout the academic year, including readings and workshops.