NEA Grant for Kenyon Review Will Boost Knox County Reading

GAMBIER, Ohio (June 23, 2009)

The National Endowment for the Arts today announced a $10,000 Big Read grant for the Kenyon Review to spur a public reading and discussion program centered on the Louise Erdrich novel Love Medicine.

The grant dovetails with the third annual Kenyon Review Literary Festival at Kenyon College this fall. The Erdrich book will be the centerpiece of a month-long series of reading-related events in Knox County. The grant provides for the free distribution of the book and related materials starting at a kick-off event in September at the Mount Vernon farmers market on the town square. At least 300 books will be given away to readers who may then join discussions in local bookstores and libraries and online.

"I think the most important thing is that it allows us to build on the literary festival that we've had the last couple of years, and a principle component of that has been to reach into the community and inspire literary reading," said David Lynn, editor of the Kenyon Review and professor of English at Kenyon. "The Big Read allows us to do this in a much more sustained and ambitious way, working with more schools and libraries, increasing the community investment in what is already a great event."

Love Medicine is an account of the lives of Native Americans on a fictional North Dakota reservation. The novel was published in 1984 and expanded by the author in 1993.

Erdrich will receive the Kenyon Review Award for Literary Achievement in New York City on November 5 and will deliver the keynote address at the literary festival at Kenyon on November 7.

Coordinated by the Kenyon Review staff, the literary festival has for two years sponsored Knox Reads, a community-wide reading and discussion program that has featured the books of previous literary achievement award winners Margaret Atwood and Richard Ford.

The Big Read grant will help expand the program into Knox County schools. Students in five high schools will read the novel and local teachers will be joined by Kenyon faculty and Kenyon Review writers in discussing the book. Kenyon students will work with teachers at five elementary schools in writing workshops based on Erdrich's children's books.