Thursday, September 07, 2000

Dana Sachs and Paul Wilkes will read from their nonfiction works at 8 p.m., Monday, September 11, in UNCW's Warwick Center Ballroom. This free public event is the first in the 2000-2001 Creative Writing Department reading series. A reception and booksigning will follow in the lobby.

Sachs, a recent graduate of UNCW's MFA Program, has published The House on Dream Street: Memoir of an American Woman in Vietnam. Her memoir takes readers through lush landscapes, religious pilgrimages, one-room houses and busy streets filled with darting bicycles, merchants and the smells of unfamiliar food, describing a people struggling to define themselves both socially and politically.

Wilkes, a visiting lecturer at UNC Wilmington, is the author of 14 non-fiction books and a novel. In addition, he has hosted, written, directed or produced seven PBS documentaries including Merton. Wilkes' other television credits include Six American Families. His most recent book, Beyond the Walls: Monastic Wisdom for Everyday Life, was published by Doubleday. Wilkes has written and lectured extensively about the role of religious belief in individual lives as well the place and impact of religion in public life.

For more information, contact the Creative Writing Department at 910/962-7063.