Robert Morgan Named UNCA Creative Writing Program's 
P.B. Parris Visiting Writer

UNCA Creative Writing Program has named Robert Morgan, author of the best-selling novel "Gap Creek," the 2000 P.B. Parris visiting writer. Morgan will give a reading of his work at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 28, in UNCA's Owen Conference Center. The event is free and open to the public.

Set in North Carolina, the highly acclaimed "Gap Creek" is a fictional account of life in the Appalachian high country during the last years of the nineteenth century. Julie and Hank Harmon, a young married couple, find that their love and marriage are tested against the challenges of flood, fire, work, and the changing times.

"Gap Creek" was chosen as the January 2000 selection for Oprah Winfrey’s book club, which catapulted it into national limelight.

Widely considered "the poet laureate of Appalachia," Morgan was born in Hendersonville and raised on farm land settled by his Welsh ancestors. He earned his bachelor’s degree at UNC Chapel Hill and a master’s degree from UNC Greensboro. He currently serves as Kappa Alpha Professor of English at Cornell University, where he has taught for more than 30 years.

Morgan is the author of 10 books of poetry, three collections of short stories and three novels. He has won the James B. Hanes Poetry Prize, the N.C. Award in Literature and the Jacaranda Review Fiction Prize. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Morgan's visit is made possible by an endowment established by the friends of P.B. Parris, a recently retired UNCA creative writing professor and author of "Waltzing in the Attic."

For more information, call the UNCA Literature Department at 828/251-6411.

Media Contacts:

• Dr. Richard Chess, Associate Literature Professor, 828/251-6576
• Jill Yarnall, UNCA Public Information Assistant, 828/251-6526