PublishersLunch
Real estate mogul Sam Zell's widow Helen
Zell will
announce a $50 million gift today to support the University of Michigan's graduate
writing program. The money "will essentially underwrite it
in perpetuity, while offering flexibility for new projects." She was
an English major at Michigan, and graduates of the writing program, which
enrolls 22 people a year, include Graduates include writers Elizabeth
Kostova, Hanna Pylvainen and Jesymn Ward. She says: "The ability of
fiction to develop creativity, to analyze the human psyche, help you understand
people — it's critical. It's as important as vitamins or anything else. To me,
it's the core of the intellectual health of human beings."
She "described the new donation as an
investment in some of the world's promising young poets and novelists, to
ensure the books they have inside them get written, shared with the
world." Already, Michigan's program "covers tuition and offers a
$22,000 stipend for students while they take classes their first year, then
pays them for teaching during their second" and provides a third year of
post-doc support.
The 25th annual Triangle Awards,
presented on April 25, will honor John
D'Emilio as the 2013 recipient of the Publishing Triangle's
Bill Whitehead Award for Lifetime Achievement. He is the author or editor of
multiple books, including Lost Prophet: The Life and Times of Bayard
Rustin, which won the Publishing Triangle's Randy Shilts Award for Gay
Nonfiction.
Separately, the Lambda Literary Awards,
also in their 25th year, announced
their nominees, across 23 categories. Winners will be announced at a
ceremony in New York on June 3.
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