News & Events

Much like everything else in 2020, the Oxford Conference for the Book, the longest-running event produced by the University of Mississippi’s Center for the Study of Southern Culture, had to be canceled because of COVID-19 a mere two weeks before the event. This year won’t exactly be business as usual, either, but a slate of … Continued

The judges for the Willie Morris Awards for Southern Writing have announced their 2019 fiction shortlist. The three finalists for this year’s prize are Chanelle Benz, for The Gone Dead; Margaret Wilkerson Sexton, for The Revisioners; and De’Shawn Charles Winslow, for In West Mills. The Willie Morris Awards are administered by the Department of Writing … Continued

Here is Laure-Anne Bosselaar, who was originally scheduled at this year’s conference, reading her poem “Chanel #5.”   Born in 1943, Laure-Anne Bosselaar grew up in Belgium and moved to the United States in 1987. She is the author of These Many Rooms (Four Way Books, 2019), A New Hunger (Ausable Press, 2007), Small Gods of … Continued

On March 15, 1998, during the Fifth Oxford Conference for the Book, singer/songwriters Tommy Goldsmith, Tom House, and Karren Pell performed their song cycle of Lee Smith’s Fair and Tender Ladies. The piece was commissioned by the Alabama Shakespeare Festival. From the book: Ivy Rowe may not have much education, but her thoughts are classic, … Continued

Poets have always been a part of the Oxford Conference for the Book, especially this year, since the first day of the conference would have coincided with the first day of National Poetry Month. Here we have Hanif Abdurraqib reading one of his poems, along with an interview in Cultured magazine from January. Abdurraqib was … Continued