Crystal Wilkinson, a former Kentucky poet laureate and an award-winning author, will read from her bestselling culinary memoir, “Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts: Stories and Recipes from Five Generations of Black Country Cooks,” at the University of Lynchburg on Wednesday, March 11.
The event, which is free and open to the public, will be held at 7:30 p.m. in Hall Campus Center’s Memorial Ballroom. A book signing will follow, during which copies of “Praisesong” and Wilkinson’s NAACP Image Award-winning poetry collection, “Perfect Black,” will be available for purchase.
University of Lynchburg students who attend the reading will be entered into a raffle to win copies of Wilkinson’s books. While on campus, the author also will meet with students in Dr. Kelly Jacobson’s Advanced Creative Writing class.
“Students in Advanced Creative Writing focus on their goals as future published authors, rather than just as writers enjoying the craft, so getting to talk to a working author in a small group setting about both her creative and professional choices will inspire them to forge their own path,” Jacobson, an assistant professor of English, said.
Dr. Cheryl Coleman ’84 MEd assigned “Perfect Black” to students in her American Multi-Ethnic Culture class in the fall of 2023. Coleman, dean of Lynchburg’s School of Liberal Arts and Sciences, recommended Wilkinson for the upcoming event, which is part of the Richard H. Thornton Reading Series.
“I taught Southern Literature for years and heard about Crystal Wilkinson during my study of Affrilachian poets,” Coleman said. “I really think that not enough people have known about Crystal and her work, even though she has published widely and was Kentucky’s poet laureate.
“I do believe, however, that is changing, especially with the January 2024 publication of her book ‘Praisesong.’
“Food writing is a growing genre, and in her recent Library of Virginia speech, Crystal made the statement that likely explains the appeal: ‘Food is culture, food is region, food is ancestry, food is love.’
“I particularly enjoy her multi-genre writing — short stories, novel, poetry, cookbook/memoir — and feel sure she will appeal to a wide audience.”
In addition to “Praisesong” and “Perfect Black,” Wilkinson is the author of three novels, “The Birds of Opulence,” “Water Street,” and “Blackberries, Blackberries.” A memoir, “Heartsick,” is forthcoming.
In addition to the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Poetry, Wilkinson has received the O. Henry Price, Academy of American Poets Fellowship, USA Fellowship, and Ernest J. Gaines Prize for Literary Excellence.
She has been recognized by the Yaddo Foundation, Hedgebrook, Vermont Studio Center for the Arts, The Hermitage, and other organizations, and has been published in The Atlantic, The Kenyon Review, Oxford American, and various journals and anthologies.
Wilkinson currently teaches creative writing at the University of Kentucky, where she is a Bush-Holbrook endowed professor and director of the Division of Creative Writing.
“I have seen her in multiple online events, reading and discussing literature, and she’s a joy to listen to, very approachable,” Coleman said. “Crystal is a wise, strongly grounded woman and is willing to make herself vulnerable in sharing stories about her life and experiences, both in her writing and in public appearances.
“I’m really looking forward to reading her upcoming memoir, ‘Heartsick,’ which is about her mother’s mental illness and institutionalization. The University of Lynchburg is fortunate that she will be on our campus, speaking to our campus and local Lynchburg community.”
For more information about the reading, contact Jacobson at [email protected].
The Thornton Endowment brings established writers to campus each semester — novelists, poets, playwrights, journalists, essayists, and others. Over a day or two, these visiting writers do a public reading or lecture, and oftentimes they meet with creative writing students for classes or workshops.
The visits complement the English Department’s writing courses, which include Introduction to Creative Writing, Fiction Writing, Poetry Writing, and Writing in the Workplace, all of which are taught by University of Lynchburg faculty who are writers as well as teachers.
