Distinguished Poet Joseph Bathanti to be Featured Reader for Mountain Wordsmiths

JOSEPH BATHANTI

Mountain Wordsmiths writers are honored to have as our featured reader the distinguished poet, author, and former Poet Laureate of NC, Joseph Bathanti on Thursday morning, June 23, at 10:30 via Zoom. 

The monthly gathering, sponsored by the North Carolina Writers’ Network-West, is continuing its online presence because local writers, as well as writers from other states and cities, are joining us each month on Zoom.

Bathanti is the author of ten books of poetry. 

His novel, East Liberty, won the 2001 Carolina Novel Award. His novel, Coventry, won the 2006 Novello Literary Award. His book of stories, The High Heart, won the 2006 Spokane Prize. They Changed the State: The Legacy of North Carolina’s Visiting Artists, 1971-1995, his book of nonfiction, was published in early 2007. The novel, The Life of the World to Come, was released by the University of South Carolina Press in late 2014. His more recent book of personal essays, Half of What I Say Is Meaningless, winner of the Will D. Campbell Award for Creative Nonfiction, is from Mercer University Press. A new volume of poems, Light at the Seam, is forthcoming in 2022 from LSU Press. 

Bathanti is the McFarlane Family Distinguished Professor of Interdisciplinary Education & Writer-in-Residence of Appalachian State University’s Watauga Residential College in Boone, NC. He was named Poet Laureate of North Carolina (2012-14) and received the 2016 North Carolina Award for Literature.

He served as the 2016 Charles George VA Medical Center Writer-in-Residence in Asheville, NC, and is the co-founder of the Medical Center’s Creative Writing Program. Bathanti lives in Vilas, NC, with his wife, Joan, and two children. He and his wife met while both were working with the VISTA program.

NCWN-West is continuing to stay in touch by using technology to share our writing. 

We will offer writing events and writing classes online until we can safely meet face-to-face again. Many writers are enjoying the convenience and flexibility of Zoom meetings because of the ability to join us from other locations.

Those wishing to attend Mountain Wordsmiths may contact Carroll Taylor at vibiaperpetua@gmail.com to receive the Zoom link. We welcome those who would simply like to listen to the beauty of wordsmithing.