SLU Community Invited to Participate in St. Louis Literary Award Events This Week

ST. LOUIS – Renowned Antigua-born author Jamaica Kincaid will receive the St. Louis Literary Award this week.

Tickets for the 2024 St. Louis Literary Award presentation are still available. Kincaid will receive the Literary Award at the Sheldon Concert Hall at 7 p.m. on Thursday, April 25.

A craft talk will be held at 10 a.m. on Friday, April 26, in the Anheuser-Busch Auditorium in Cook Hall. The craft talk is free and no registration is required.

Kincaid explores themes of colonialism, gender and sexuality, racism, class, and familial relationships in her work. She came to the United States as a teenager and, as a young woman, began writing columns and stories for Ingénue, The Village Voice, and Ms.

Her work has also appeared in The Paris Review and The New Yorker.

Kincaid published her first book in 1983, “At the Bottom of the River,” is a collection of short stories and reflections. She is the author of the novels “Annie John,” “Lucy,” and “See Now Then,” and the more personal books “The Autobiography of My Mother,” “Among Flowers: A Walk in the Himalaya,” and “My Brother,” which explores the death from AIDS of her younger brother. 

Craft Talk Podcast

Season three of the St. Louis Literary Award Craft Talk podcast dropped on Tuesday, April 23.

In each episode, hosts Edward Ibur and Kate Essig interview writers, artists, educators and other visionaries to explore their creative processes and world perspectives. Iber is the executive director of the St. Louis Literary Award and Essig is a student in the School of Education. 

Two episodes are available now. The episodes feature the St. Louis Post-Dispatch’s Derrick Goold, the beat writer covering the St. Louis Cardinals, and Mahogany L. Browne, a poet, playwright and young adult novelist.

The Craft Talk podcast is available for download via iTunes, Google Play, and Spotify.

St. Louis Literary Award 

The St. Louis Literary Award is presented annually by the Saint Louis University Libraries and has become one of the top literary prizes in the country. The award honors a writer who deepens our insight into the human condition and expands the scope of our compassion. Some of the most important writers of the 20th and 21st centuries have come to Saint Louis University to accept the honor, including Margaret Atwood, Salmon Rushdie, Eudora Welty, John Updike, Saul Bellow, August Wilson, Stephen Sondheim, Zadie Smith and Tom Wolfe.