Pulitzer Prize-winning author, D.C. native and visiting professor Edward P. Jones is the subject of a thorough and thoughtful article in The Washington Post.
The article and accompanying photo essay, dated Sunday, Nov. 15, mentions a celebratory drink he had with GW students in Froggy Bottom Pub and features Jones speaking about the old University hospital site, where his mother died.
Jones came to GW as a Wang Visiting Professor in Contemporary English last year, thanks to a donation to the English department in 2008. He taught 15 students in an advanced creative writing course in fiction and a month-long book club, where he read his favorite novels with a class of 12 students (including, for full disclosure, this author.) The English department gave out 1,000 copies of “The Known World” and hosted a handful of readings with Jones, as well.
In the article, Post Staff Writer Neely Tucker describes Jones as “arguably the greatest fiction writer the nation’s capital has ever produced” and possibly “the most enigmatic.” It’s worth a read.
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Any of Jones’ students or colleagues want to react or add anything to Tucker’s profile? Who nabbed a free copy of “The Known World”?
The books chosen by Jones for the book club included Mary Lavin’s “In a Cafe,” David Anthony Durham’s “Gabriel’s Story,” Chaim Potok’s “The Chosen” and Richard Wright’s “Uncle Tom’s Children.” The two things I remember most clearly about Jones and the book-club class: his humility and his vivid description of his almost furniture-less apartment. Oh, that and racing to George Mason University to get Lavin’s “In a Cafe” on a Sunday night.
