University Times

Lovers of literature and poetry can “curl up” with a good author during the eighth season of the Pittsburgh contemporary writers series 2005-2006 at Pitt, featuring award-winning authors and poets.

The season opens Oct. 19 with author Charles Baxter, winner of an Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Prix St. Valentine in France and the Book of the Year Award from the Catalan Booksellers Association in Spain.

All readings begin at 8:30 p.m. and are held in the Frick Fine Arts auditorium, except the Nov. 2 Drue Heinz Literature Prize reading, which starts at 7:30 p.m., and the Nov. 10 Michael Ondaatje appearance, which will be held in David Lawrence auditorium.

The series includes:

• Oct. 19: Charles Baxter, author, “Saul and Patsy,” “The Feast of Love,” “Believers,” “Burning Down the House” and “Shadow Play.

• Nov. 2: Drue Heinz Literature Prize reading — Stewart O’Nan, 2005 judge and 1993 Drue Heinz Literature Prize winner for “In the Walled City.” Author of “A Prayer for the Dying,” “The Speed Queen,” “The Good Wife,” “Snow Angels” and “A World Away”; and David Harris Ebenbach, 2005 Drue Heinz Literature Prize winner for “Between Camelots.”

• Nov. 10: Michael Ondaatje, 2005 William Block Sr. Writer; author of “The English Patient,” “Anil’s Ghost,” “Coming Through Slaughter,” “The Cinnamon Peeler” and “Running in the Family.”

• Feb. 8: David Berman, poet, “Actual Air.”

• March 27: Anne Carson, poet, “The Beauty of the Husband,” “Autobiography of Red,” “Plainwater,” “Men in the Off Hours,” “Eros the Bittersweet” and “If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho.”

• April 5: Natasha Tretheway, poet, “Domestic Work” and “Bellocq’s Ophelia.”

For more information, call 412/624-6505 or visit www.english.pitt.edu.

The Contemporary Writers Series is co-sponsored by the Wyndham Garden Hotel-University Place and the University’s Book Center, Department of Classics, University of Pittsburgh Press and the creative nonfiction program.