Maxine Hong Kingston, alumni of Art Workshop International, receives a lifetime achievement award this next month. Those fortunate people who worked with her the summer of 2007 know what an insightful teacher she is. Her literary experience and expression, ranging from fiction to poetry, is only surpassed by her character - wise, kind, and endowed with a sense of quiet strength.
-Chris Spencer

The National Book Foundation announced today that Maxine Hong Kingston would receive its 2008 Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters and Barney Rosset the 2008 Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the Literary Community.
Both will be presented at the 2008 National Book Awards ceremony on Wednesday, November 19th. The Foundation also announced that writer and actor Eric Bogosian will host this year’s National Book Award Ceremony and Dinner.

Now in its 19th year, the recipient of the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters is a person who has enriched our literary heritage over a life of service, or a corpus of work. Past recipients include Norman Mailer, John Updike, Toni Morrison, Arthur Miller, Judy Blume, David McCullough, Ray Bradbury and Joan Didion. For more about these and other past honorees, please visit the Foundation’s website at http://www.nationalbook.org/amerletters.html.
The Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the Literary Community, created in 2005, honors an individual whose life and work exemplify the goals of the National Book Foundation to expand the audience for literature and enhance the cultural value of literature in America. Past recipients include Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Terry Gross.