PITT WELCOMES AUTHOR MAXINE HONG KINGSTON TO ITS PITTSBURGH CONTEMPORARY WRITERS SERIES

PITTSBURGH, Oct. 2 -- Author Maxine Hong Kingston will grace the University of Pittsburgh stage as the Pittsburgh Contemporary Writers Series welcomes its second speaker of the season on Wednesday, Oct. 14, at 8:15 p.m. in 120 David Lawrence Hall, Forbes Ave., Oakland.

Kingston, an American of Chinese descent, has received critical attention over the past quarter-century. Among her published works are two books of nonfiction, "The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts," which won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction and was also one of Time magazine's Top Ten nonfiction works of the decade, and "China Men," as well as a novel, "Tripmaster Monkey."

In 1997 Kingston received the National Humanities Medal from President Clinton. Other awards include the California Council for the Humanities Award in 1985, the California Governor's Award for the Arts in 1989, and the PEN USA West Award in Fiction for "Tripmaster Monkey."

Kingston teaches at the University of California, Berkeley. In addition to her books, Kingston has also written essays, reviews, poems and stories for the English Journal, New York Times Magazine, MS, American Heritage, Michigan Quarterly Review, Literary Cavalcade, Mother Jones, Caliban, Sulfur, New Yorker, Iowa Review, and New York Times Book Review.

Other writers scheduled to appear at Pitt's series over the next few months are Marita Golden, Mark Doty, Barry Lopez, and Tess Gallagher. Gay Talese appeared in September.

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