The world of publishing is changing right before our eyes, with established authors choosing to go the self-publishing route. Anisfield-Wolf’s very own John Edgar Wideman chose to self-publish his collection of short stories, Briefs, with Lulu.com in 2010. Check out this video of young actor Theron Cook giving a steady performance of one of his stories, “Bananas.”
Author: Tara Jefferson
David Eltis, Woodruff Professor of History at Emory University, along with his co-author David Richardson, has complied one of the most exhaustive works on the subject of the Atlantic slave trade. Their ground-breaking work was turned into the website, www.SlaveVoyages.org, where visitors can get estimates of the slave trade, research African names, and get detailed maps regarding the passage of slaves from one country to another. Check out this short clip for more information on the project.
Thinking about picking up a book from one of the 2011 Anisfield-Wolf winners? Check out this brief reading from Mary Helen Stefaniak and see if her 2010 novel, The Cailiffs of Baghdad, Georgia, might make its way onto your Christmas list.
2011 Anisfield-Wolf Award winner Nicole Krauss, honored for her 2010 novel Great House, was selected as one of 12 honorees of USA Network’s Character Approved award. Here she speaks in this short clip about her approach to writing and how she doesn’t view it as simply putting words to paper, but rather, it’s more like architecture.
In this brief interview from Knopf’s “Writers on Writing” series, 2011 Anisfield-Wolf winner Isabel Wilkerson discusses the lengthy, grueling process of writing her award-winning book, The Warmth of Other Suns. She says, “I am so glad that I didn’t know it would take 15 years. Had I know it would take 15 years, I don’t think I would have embarked upon it.”
See Knopf’s full series of informational interviews with some of today’s best writers here.
Since 2009, an emerging young poet from Northeast Ohio is celebrated along with the winning authors at the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards ceremony in Cleveland.
At the 2011 ceremony, Essence Cain, a sixth-grader at Miller South School for Visual and Performing Arts in Akron, Ohio, recited “In the Flower Market,” a poem she and her classmates wrote for “Speak Peace,” an international youth arts program created by Kent State University’s Wick Poetry Center. American children in the program wrote poems in response to paintings created by Vietnamese children. The exhibit of paintings and poems is traveling nationally through 2013.
Essence has appeared in plays and musicals at venues throughout Ohio. She was a contributing writer and reader for the animated e-greetings of the 2009 Traveling Stanzas series, Peace Stanzas. She has performed poetry with the Wick Poetry Center Outreach program at the 2011 Virginia Hamilton Conference at Kent State University and the Association of Writers and Writing Programs national conference in Washington D.C. in 2011.
In the Flower Market
Tiger lilies roar in the cold April rain.
Tulips seek friends with their spray of pollen.
Sunflowers flash in the night,
Illuminating the world like a candle.
Bluebells drip with dew—
They love just being themselves.
Marigolds sing, mango trees ding.
Orchids fly like birds in the wind.
Flowers from all over the world
Spread their colors like peacocks.
Peace is what puts them all together.
Here is a video of Essence reading “In the Flower Market” as part of the “Speak Peace” program.
CLEVELAND, Ohio (April 12, 2011) – The Cleveland Foundation today announced the winners of the 76th Annual Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards www.Anisfield-Wolf.org
They are:
- Nicole Krauss, Great House, Fiction
- Mary Helen Stefaniak, The Cailiffs of Baghdad, Georgia, Fiction
- David Eltis/David Richardson, Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, Nonfiction
- Isabel Wilkerson, The Warmth of Other Suns, Nonfiction
- John Edgar Wideman, Lifetime Achievement
“The 2011 Anisfield-Wolf winners are notable for the unique way each author addresses the complex issues of race and cultural diversity,” said Henry Louis Gates Jr., the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University, who serves as jury chair. “The books and authors honored this year stand out, not only for their creative and wide-ranging approach to difficult subject matter, but also for their underlying faith in our shared humanity.”
“Cleveland poet and philanthropist Edith Anisfield Wolf created this book prize more than 75 years ago because of her conviction that the issue of race was the most critical dilemma facing the United States. It was her fervent desire to break down stereotypes and encourage civil discourse so that future generations would be more appreciative of human diversity,” said Cleveland Foundation President and Chief Executive Officer Ronald B. Richard. “This prize remains a fitting testimony to the vision of a woman truly ahead of her time.”
About the Anisfield-Wolf Prize
The Anisfield-Wolf winners will be honored in Cleveland on September 15 at a ceremony hosted by the Cleveland Foundation and emceed by Jury Chair Gates. Rita Dove, Joyce Carol Oates, Steven Pinker and Simon Schama also served on the jury. The Cleveland Foundation has administered the book awards since 1963, upon the death of its creator, Edith Anisfield Wolf. The Anisfield-Wolf prize remains the only juried American literary competition devoted to recognizing books that have made an important contribution to society’s understanding of racism and the diversity of human cultures.
About the Cleveland Foundation
Established in 1914, the Cleveland Foundation is the world’s first community foundation and the nation’s second-largest today, with assets of $1.87 billion and 2010 grants of nearly $85 million. The foundation improves the lives of Greater Clevelanders by building community endowment, addressing needs through grantmaking, and providing leadership on vital issues. Currently the foundation proactively directs two-thirds of its flexible grant dollars to the community’s greatest needs: economic transformation, public education reform, human services and youth development, neighborhoods, and arts advancement.
For more information on the Cleveland Foundation, visit www.ClevelandFoundation.org.
The Anisfield-Wolf book prize turns 75 this year. Quite an accomplishment from a shy poet and philanthropist in Cleveland, who in 1935 had the insight to see race relations as the nation’s critical issue; one that could continue to eat away and destroy us if progress wasn’t made.
Edith Anisfield Wolf was passionate in her belief that we could break down stereotypes that arise from fear, myth, and ignorance. She wanted to encourage people to think beyond what they knew and what was familiar; to read works that open new worlds and ideas; and debate these critical issues to open and challenge our ways of thinking. It was her desire that through these conversations, participants and future generations would gain better understanding of others and appreciate the richness in our differences.
That’s why she created the Anisfield-Wolf book prize. Thanks to her vision, some of the world’s greatest literary voices are known and respected for their contributions to our nation’s cultural identity. Familiar authors, including Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Thurston, Ralph Ellison and Gwendolyn Brooks, weren’t always as well received as they are today due to the color of their skin or the subject matter of the works. That level of respect changed with the Anisfield-Wolf book prize, often referred to as the “Black Pulitzer” in its early years.
In today’s ever-more-global society, issues of race and cultural identity continue to both unite and divide us. Thanks to efforts such as the Anisfield-Wolf book prize, a greater number of diverse voices are participating in the conversation, opening and challenging our minds.
What works and writers have influenced you?
Are we closer to achieving Edith Anisfield Wolf’s vision of gaining a greater understanding and appreciation for others?
Tell us what you think.