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 The theme for the Charter Day celebration is "Lincoln and
Poetics." Abraham Lincoln was a great lover of poetry, wrote poetry
and displayed a poetic style in some of his greatest speeches.
Formal presentations will be made by Kevin Stein, the poet laureate
for the state of Illinois, and by noted author, playwright and
biographer Daniel Mark Epstein.
Charter Day is an opportunity to come together and celebrate a
shared Lincoln College experience, so the event is open to alumni,
faculty, staff and students. However, seating will be limited.
Anyone seeking additional information should contact the Office of
Alumni Relations and Special Events at 800-569-0556.
The only college or university named for Abraham Lincoln during
his lifetime, Lincoln College was established in 1865, when it
became one of the pioneer educational institutions in the Midwest.
Founders investigated several sites for a college, and in December
1864, they picked the town of Lincoln as the site for a new
institution for higher learning. The college was officially
chartered by the General Assembly of the state of Illinois on Feb.
6, 1865. The college marks the historic event every five years with
a Charter Day celebration on or around Feb. 12 -- Abraham Lincoln's
birthday.
More about Kevin Stein:
In December 2003, the governor of Illinois named Kevin Stein the
Illinois poet laureate, filling the position previously held by
Howard Austin, Carl Sandburg and Gwendolyn Brooks. This accolade is
one of many Stein has earned during his career as poet, critic,
editor and teacher. Stein is author of seven poetry collections,
three scholarly books, two poetry anthologies, and numerous poems
and essays published in journals as well as anthologies. His work
has received acclaim from reviewers, including recent pieces by
Julia Keller in the Chicago Tribune and Mark Eleveld in the Chicago
Sun-Times. His newest collection, "Sufficiency of the Actual," was
published in January 2009 by University of Illinois Press.
Stein's first poetry volume, "A Circus of Want," earned the
Devins Award for Poetry. His poetry has been honored with the
Frederick Bock Prize awarded by Poetry, the 1998 Indiana Review
Poetry Prize and four Illinois Arts Council Literary Awards -- the
most recent awarded in 2007 for his poem "Middle-aged Adam's and
Eve's Bedside Tables."
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Stein has been the recipient of the National Endowment for the
Arts Poetry Fellowship and three such fellowships granted by the
Illinois Arts Council, as well as grant support from the National
Endowment for the Humanities. In 2004, he was awarded the Vernon
Louis Parrington Medal for Distinguished Writing. His poems and
essays have appeared widely in journals such as American Poetry
Review, Boulevard, Colorado Review, The Kenyon Review, Poetry,
Southern Review and TriQuarterly. In addition to poetry, Stein has
written several scholarly works, including his forthcoming book of
essays, "Poetry's Afterlife: Verse in the Digital Age," due in May
2010.
More about Daniel Mark Epstein:
Epstein is a biographer, poet and dramatist whose work has been
widely published and performed. In the 1970s his poetry first
appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly and The New
Republic. His first volume of poems was published in 1973. His plays
appeared soon thereafter in regional theater and off-Broadway, and
in 1978 he received the Prix de Rome for his poetry and dramatic
works.
In the 1980s he wrote his first biography, "Sister Aimee: The
Life of Aimee Semple McPherson," now in its fourth printing. His
biography of Nat King Cole was a 1999 New York Times Notable Book,
reviewed on the cover of the NYT Book Review, and his biography of
Edna St. Vincent Millay was a New York Public Library Honoree,
"Books to Remember" for 2001. "The Lincolns: Portrait of a
Marriage," was named one of the "Best Books of 2008" by both The
Wall Street Journal and Chicago Sun-Times.
His honors include a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship
in 1974, a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1984 and an Academy Award for
Lifetime Achievement from the American Academy of Arts and Letters
in 2006.
[Text from file received from
Lincoln College] |
