Bengali writer Binayak Banerjee to participate in IOWA Writing Program

The U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) Division has funded the 15 selected writers to participate in the 2014 International Writing Program (IWP) and is a vital partner with the University of Iowa for the writer’s residency. 

ECA funding will also cover the costs of their participation in cultural exchange activities in the fields of writing, translation, and optional collaboration projects with artists from other disciplines including music, theater, and dance.  The program will help to bring the selected writer’s countries' literary works to a wider audience and for them to learn more about American literature. 

They will spend 10 weeks in residence at the University of Iowa in Iowa City presenting their work to local audiences, working with student translators, and participating in classes and workshops.  The 2014 program will also include field trips to attend literary events across the country travelling for at least 10 days within the United States to meet with local writers and collaborate with artists in other fields. 

The International Writing Program (IWP) is the oldest and largest multinational writing residency in the world.  With a tradition of excellence that has continued on for nearly five decades, the IWP annually brings outstanding authors from every continent to the University of Iowa. 

Since 1967, over 1,400 writers from more than 130 nations have taken part in the Fall Residency.  The goal of the IWP is to provide authors not only with the setting for cultural exchange, but also with the time and space to write, read, translate, study, conduct research, travel, give readings, stage work, and become part of the vibrant literary and academic community at the University of Iowa – a major American research institution – and in Iowa City, the only American city designated as a UNESCO City of Literature. Further details about the program are available on the IWP website http://iwp.uiowa.edu/.

Binayak Banerjee is the author of the novels -- A Year with Sohagini, The Winner, and Star Harbor, poetry collections You My Life, You Alien, and One Hundred Love Poems as well as the play Rabindranath Public Limited.  He writes for Bengali literary magazines, is engaged with the Shakespeare Society of Eastern India and teaches English at the Sri Ram Roy School and the Syamaprasad College in Kolkata.