News Release

Novelist Porochista Khakpour and poet Steve Scafidi will present a joint reading hosted by the Writing Seminars at The Johns Hopkins University at 6 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 8, in Remsen Hall, Room 101, on the university's Homewood campus, 3400 N. Charles St. in Baltimore. The event is free and open to the public.

Porochista Khakpour earned her master's degree from the Writing Seminars in 2003. She was born in Tehran, Iran, in 1978. Khakpour was raised in the Los Angeles area and attended Sarah Lawrence College. Her writing has appeared in the Chicago Reader, The Village Voice, nymag.com, Paper, Nylon, Gear, Alef, Raygun, spin.com, Flaunt, Bikini, Bidoun, and nerve.com, among others. She currently lives in New York City. Her debut novel, Sons and Other Flammable Objects, was released by Grove Press in September 2007. In its Sept. 9 review of the novel, The New York Times remarked, "Punchy conversation, vivid detail, sharp humor biting humor and acute cultural observations ... Khakpour brings her characters vividly to life." More biographical information is available online at her blog, porochistakhakpour.blogspot.com/.

Steve Scafidi was raised in Virginia and earned his master of fine arts degree at Arizona State University. His first book of poems, Sparks from a Nine-Pound Hammer (Louisiana State University Press, 2001), was nominated for the 2001 National Book Award and the 2002 Pulitzer Prize, and won the Fifth Annual Larry Levis Reading Prize. His second book, For Love of Common Words, was published by Louisiana State University Press in spring 2006. He works as a cabinet maker and lives in West Virginia with his wife and daughter. Recordings of Scafidi reading his poems can be found online at fishousepoems.org/archives/steve_scafidi/index.shtml .

For information about the event, contact Douglas Basford at dbasford@jhu.edu or (410) 516-6139.