The Center for Literary Arts is pleased to present acclaimed author, Joy Williams in a reading from her latest novel Harrow and conversation with Oscar Villalon on Thursday, April 27, 2023 at the Student Union Theater at 7PM PST. 

Joy Williams is the author of four previous novels--including The Quick and the Dead, a runner-up for the Pulitzer Prize--and four collections of stories, as well as Ill Nature, a book of essays that was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Among her many honors are the Rea Award for the Short Story and the Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She was elected to the Academy in 2008. She lives in Tucson, Arizona, and Laramie, Wyoming.

Oscar Villalon is the managing editor at ZYZZYVA, which won a 2022 Whiting Literary Magazine Prize. His writing has been published in Stranger’s Guide, Freeman’s, The Believer, Literary Hub, and other publications. A former book editor at the San Francisco Chronicle, he has served three times on the fiction jury (once as chair) for the Pulitzer Prize, and was most recently the chair of the nonfiction judging committee for the National Book Awards. He lives with his family in San Francisco.

This event is made possible thanks to the continued support of the Martha Heasley Cox Lecture. This generous endowment, created by San José State Professor Emeritus Martha Heasley Cox, established an ongoing series to bring celebrated and influential authors to San José. 

For more information, please visit clasanjose.org.