THE ROBERT C. WRIGHT MINNESOTA WRITER RESIDENCY

Fiction writer and 2008-09 Robert Wright Award winner

Lindsay Schacht

Poet and creative nonfiction writer

Heid E. Erdrich

Fiction writer and writer for children

Lise Erdrich

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Talk on craft
3:00 P.M.—CSU Ostrander Auditorium
Reading
7:30 P.M.—CSU Room 253

Lindsay Schacht grew up in Pine Island, Minnesota, and lived there for 18 years before attending Minnesota State University, where she is currently a creative writing major. She has published a story in Blue Earth Review and plans, after graduation, on pursuing an MFA.

Heid E. Erdrich won a Minnesota Voices award for first poetry collection Fishing for Myth, recently re-issued from New Rivers Press. She also authored The Mother's Tongue, from Salt Publishing’s Earthworks series, and co-edited Sister Nations: Native American Women on Community from the Minnesota Historical Society Press. She has been recipient of two Minnesota State Arts Board fellowships, awards from The Loft Literary Center, the Bush Foundation, and has three times been nominated for the Minnesota Book Award. A member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Ojibway, Erdrich grew up in Wahpeton, North Dakota. She earned degrees from Dartmouth College and Johns Hopkins University Writing Seminars. After decades of teaching college, including many years as a tenured faculty member, she now gives writing workshops and serves as visiting writer at colleges and universities across the country. She lives with two kids, one kind husband and a small terrier. Her driver’s license states she is an organ donor.

Lise Erdrich was born in Minnesota, lives in Wahpeton, North Dakota, and has worked in Indian health and education for over twenty years. A graduate of the University of North Dakota and of Minnesota State University, Mankato, she is the author of the children’s picture books Sacagawea and Bears Make Rock Soup. Stories from Night Train, her first collection for adults, have received many awards including the Minnesota Monthly Tamarack Award, the Many Mountains Moving Flash Fiction Contest, and Best of Show at the North Dakota State Fair, where the story “Zanimoo” was exhibited between a pig and the pickles, jams, jellies and preserves. Erdrich’s essays and stories have also appeared in several journals and anthologies including Sister Nations: Native American Women Writers on Community, and Visit Teepee Town: Native Writings After the Detours.

See a writing sample by Schacht.

See a writing sample by Heid Erdrich.

See a writing sample by Lise Erdrich.

Listen to the interview, craft talk, or reading.

To learn more about Heid Erdrich, see this web site.

To learn more about Lise Erdrich, see this web site.

If you attended any component of this residency, please offer your comments.

This year's Good Thunder Reading Series is funded by the Minnesota State University Department of English, the College of Arts and Humanities, the Office of Institutional Diversity, the Nadine B. Andreas Endowment, the Eddice B. Barber Visiting Writer Endowment, the Robert C. Wright Endowment, and individual donors. This activity is made possible in part by a grant provided by the Prairie Lakes Regional Arts Council from funds appropriated by the Minnesota State Legislature and the McKnight Foundation. This activity is also made possible in part by a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, through an appropriation by the Minnesota State Legislature and a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. MSU Library Services and Barnes & Noble Bookstore at Minnesota State offer additional support.