Join us for a reading from members of St. Edward’s University’s Literature, Writing and Rhetoric department. Featuring Alan Altimont, Timothy Braun, Amy Clements, Mary Helen Specht, Sasha West, Michael Yang, and Beth Eakman.

Alan Altimont (top row, left) has been translating the largely neglected Latin poetry of Marbod of Rennes (1035-1123 CE), the only early medieval European to write poems about himself, his sexuality, aesthetic experience, and the writing of poetry. He is an associate professor of English at St. Edward’s University, where he has taught various literature, creative writing, and composition courses for more than thirty years.

Timothy Braun (top row, middle) is just a guy with a dog, you know? He will read from his New York Times essay Four-Legged Reason to Keep it Real and the opening monologue from his new play Happiness, or Counter Culture in the Age of Fascism, Formerly Titled Seagull 2: Electric Boogaloo: A “Comedy” Kind of, Sort of, Based on Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull, but Without Jokes and Meaning, which he is writing in conjunction with his students at St. Edward’s University.

Amy Clements (top row, right) holds an MFA in creative writing from The New School and has served on the faculty of St. Edward’s since 2012. Her short fiction has appeared in The Beloit Fiction Journal, Southern Humanities Review, and The South Carolina Review. She is also the author of The Art of Prestige, a history of the Knopf publishing house.

Mary Helen Specht’s debut novel, Migratory Animals, was an Editors’ Choice by the New York Times Book Review and the Austin American-Statesmen, an IndieNext Pick, and an Apple iBook selection. Migratory Animals also won the Texas Institute of Letters Best First Fiction Award and the Writers’ League of Texas Best Book of Fiction. A previous Fulbright Scholar to Nigeria and Dobie-Paisano Fellow, Specht (bottom row, left) is currently an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at St. Edward’s University. Texas Monthly has named her one of “Ten Writers to Watch.”

Sasha West’s first book, Failure and I Bury the Body, was a winner of the National Poetry Series and the Texas Institute of Letters First Book of Poetry Award. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in American Poetry Review, Kenyon Review Online, Crazyhorse, Copper Nickel, and elsewhere. West (bottom row, second from left) is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at St. Edward’s University in Austin, TX.

Michael Yang’s stories and essays have appeared in Ploughshares, Michigan Quarterly Review, Boulevard, The Seattle Review, and other publications. Yang (bottom row, second from right) is currently working on a book of short stories and a novel.

Beth Eakman’s essays have appeared in a wide variety of publications, including Brain, Child Magazine, New York Family Magazine, and the late, lamented AustinMama.com. Eakman (bottom row, right) is currently working on a memoir. Beth lives with her husband in Austin, Texas, where she has taught writing at St. Edward’s University since 2006.