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    The Least of These, Todd Davis's new book of poetry

    October 16, 2009

    Michigan State University Press will publish Todd Davis's most recent book of poetry in January 2010. Copies can be proe-ordered on Amazon.com. Todd's work has been featured on The Writer's Almanac. This is his third book of poems.

    http://www.amazon.com/Least-These-Todd-F-Davis/dp/0870138758/ref=pd_rhf_p_t_2

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    The Book on Fire by Keith Miller

    September 23, 2009

    The Book on Fire is the newest novel by Keith Miller, author of The Book of Flying.

    Miller, who probed difference and desire in The Book of Flying--described by Ursula LeGuin as "original in concept, elegant in language"--now explores the relationship between creation and destruction in The Book on Fire.

    Just released by Immanion Press, the novel is available for purchase on Amazon.com. Like The Book of Flying, The Book of Fire is accompanied by Miller's arresting artwork, this time in the form of original woodcuts.

    To learn more about Keith Miller's books, and to view his art work, visit …

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    The Illuminations, translated by Keith Miller

    September 23, 2009

    Rimbaud's Illuminations, freshly translated by Keith Miller, have just been published by Quinx Books and are available for purchase on Amazon.com.

    http://www.amazon.com/Illuminations-Arthur-Rimbaud/dp/1448637295/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1253619577&sr=1-1

    One of these translations will appear in the November/December issue of the CMW Journal, dedicated to new poetry by writers from Mennonite contexts.

    To learn more about Miller's translations and his other work, visit his website at www.millerworlds.com

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    Mennonite/s Writing in Manitoba

    September 17, 2009

    The 5th Mennonite/s Writing Conference, "Mennonite/s Writing in Manitoba," will be held at the University of Winnipeg in Manitoba, Canada, October 1-4, 2009. The conference will begin on Thursday evening, October 1, and will feature major readings on Thursday and Friday evenings, academic plenary sessions on Friday and Saturday during the day, and an all-day bus tour of major Mennonite literary sites/sights of southern Manitoba all day Sunday.

    Writers who have agreed to read from their work include Rudy Wiebe, Armin Wiebe, Sarah Klassen, Di Brandt, Patrick Friesen, David Bergen, David Elias, David Waltner-Toews, Sandra Birdsell, and others. We will …

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    Martyrdom and Memory

    September 17, 2009

    Is publishing a memoir, a story, or a poem an act of self-indulgence--or of self-sacrifice? Read the provocative new work in our journal issue on Martyrs and offer your opinion on this and other topics in our interactive blog! Click on the posting link to the left of the journal item you wish to discuss, or click on the question you'd like to discuss in our "community" section below.

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    Rhoda Janzen in the NYTimes

    September 14, 2009

    An excerpt from Rhoda Janzen's new memoir, Mennonite in a Little Black Dress, appears in this week's New York Times Magazine.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/13/magazine/13lives-t.html?_r=1&ref=magazine

    For a hilarious but thought-provoking interview with Janzen, visit http://us.macmillan.com/author/rhodajanzen

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    Mennonite Writers' Tour of Literary Manitoba

    September 2, 2009


    A one-day bus tour of literary Manitoba, with writers reading in the very
    landscapes their work inscribes, is one of the special features of the fifth
    international conference on Mennonite/s Writing, to take place at the
    University of Winnipeg on October 1-4, 2009. Rudy Wiebe, Di Brandt, David
    Bergen, and Patrick Friesen, along with Armin Wiebe, David Elias, Sarah
    Klassen, David Waltner-Toews, Maurice Mierau, John Weier, Al Reimer and
    others - all have lived and worked in this prairie landscape. Almost all
    have roots in the Mennonite communities of Winnipeg and/or southern
    Manitoba. All will read from their work.

    This …

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    Jeff Gundy reports from the Boundary Waters

    July 22, 2009

    Our little group of writers spent July 12-17 on the Boundary Waters, "Listening for the Language of Nature." We had a very fine week, of a sort that's hard to capture fully in a brief description. It rained--a lot--and was more or less constantly damp and chilly after the first day, which was (conventionally) beautiful. Still, we did a lot of canoeing (ca. 41 miles), and had some exciting/nervous moments paddling through whitecaps and lots of wind and rain. We encountered a whole set of lakes, rivers, marshes, portages, and wildlife, and discovered that among us we were up to …

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    Letters from the Gulag

    July 17, 2009

    Letters from the Gulag

    To complement Vi Dutcher’s study of the circle letter in the July issue of the CMW journal, we also recommend the very different set of Mennonite letters contained in Ruth Derksen Siemens’ Remember Us: Letters from Stalin’s Gulag (1930-37). Volume 1: The Regehr Family (Pandora 2007). The book contains the largest corpus of letters to have survived in North America from the soviet gulag. And a second volume is promised.

    The book contains 464 letters smuggled out of work and prison campus in Russia, written mainly by members of …

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    Ken Reed’s New Novel

    July 16, 2009

    Ken Reed has published his second novel about Pennsylvania Mennonites, He Flew Too High (Enumclaw, WA: WinePress, 2009). It concerns a church split in the 1950s that led to tragic physical and spiritual consequences requiring forgiveness and healing.

    Reed says that his intention was to give an “unromanticized” view of Mennonites, in contrast to the recent public interest in romance fiction about the Amish. One reviewer says it is “part love story, part apocalyptic narrative, part suspense tale.”

    Reed, who grew up Mennonite near Lebanon, Pennsylvania, is now a Presbyterian living in Silicon Valley …