At 7:00 PM on Wednesday, June 27, 2018, the John C. Campbell
Folk School and the NC Writers' Network-West will sponsor The Literary Hour. At
this event, NCWN-West members will read at the Keith House on the JCCFS campus,
in Brasstown, NC. The Literary Hour is usually held on the third Thursday of
the month unless otherwise indicated.
This reading is free of charge and open to the public. This month's featured
readers will be Linda Grayson Jones, Brenda Kay Ledford, and Maura Payne Way.
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| Linda Grayson Jones |
Linda Grayson Jones
has read and written poetry since childhood and recalls reading The Highwayman to her 3rd grade
classmates. She has a B.S. in Biology from Stetson University, an M.A. in
Biology and a Ph.D. in Pathology from Vanderbilt University. Her career path
has been primarily in academic biomedical research, but in 2009 she returned to
her first love—teaching.
Jones is currently an Associate Professor of Biology and
Dean of Math and Science at Young Harris College. She remains a reader and
writer of poetry and is a member of North Carolina Writer’s Network. She credits Nancy Simpson for encouraging her
to use Grayson Jones as her published poet’s name.
 |
| Brenda Kay Ledford |
Brenda Kay Ledford
is a seventh-generational native of Clay County, NC. She was an honor graduate of Hayesville High
School, earned her Master of Arts in Education from Western Carolina
University, and received a diploma of highest honors in Creative Writing from
Stratford Career Institute.
Her work has appeared in many journals. Her latest poetry collection, "Crepe
Roses," won the 2015 Paul Green Multimedia Award from NC Society of
Historians. She's won this award 10
times for her books, blogs, and collecting oral history of Southern Appalachia.
Her life-experience essay, "The Front Porch," won
first place in the 2018 Cherokee/Clay County Senior Games Silver Arts Literary
Contest. She qualified for the State
Finals that will be held this fall in Raleigh.
Maura Payne Way: Originally
from Washington, D.C, Maura now makes her home in Greensboro, NC. Her debut
collection, Another Bungalow, was released by Press 53 in 2017. Her work has
appeared in Beloit Poetry Journal, O. Henry Magazine, Verse, DIAGRAM, and The
Chattahoochee Review.
Payne studied poetry at Mary Washington College and Boise
State University. In addition to her being a poet, Maura teaches 9th and 10th
grade English at New Garden Friends School. She has been a teacher for twenty
years.
