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Volume 4, Number 3
About AWM
Learn more about plans to establish the American Writers Museum
See what other people are saying about the American Writers Museum
Learn more about the Executive Planning Team and National Advisory Council
Fill out our online survey and tell us what you want to see in the American Writers Museum
Read the museum's 64-page design plan
Add your name to our mailing list and receive updates about the American Writers Museum
The mission of the American Writers Museum Foundation is to establish the first national museum in the United States dedicated to engaging the public in celebrating American writers and exploring their influence on our history, our identity, our culture and our daily lives.
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"At a time when life moves so fast and so much of what we encounter is disposable, an institution that allows us to immerse ourselves in that which is permanent and meaningful, which allows us to embrace American writing and American stories at their best and most powerful, is an intrepid and necessary idea."
-Dave Isay, Founder, StoryCorps
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 Traveling Exhibit, Writing Chicago, Planned with Grant from the Chicago Community Trust Grant 
Writing Chicago, AWM's first multimedia traveling exhibit, will feature Gwendolyn Brooks, Richard Wright, Lorraine Hansberry, and Studs Terkel, and will rotate at select libraries, museums and cultural centers in 2014.
Since the exhibit was announced, a number of libraries in other states have asked if they could house the exhibit.
Writing Chicago will include an interactive component through which visitors will share what Chicago writers' works mean to them. The exhibit will also include a crowd-source curating feature through which visitors may suggest ideas for future exhibits at the Museum.
This is the second grant provided to the American Writers Museum Foundation by the Chicago Community Trust. For more information, read the news release here.
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| Just Arrived: Anne Sexton's Writing Desk
 Linda Gray Sexton, daughter of Pulitzer prizewinning poet Anne Sexton, has donated her mother's writing desk
(shown in photograph) to the American Writers Museum. Sexton was best known for her very personal and confessional poetry. She received the Pulitzer Prize for
Poetry in 1967. Although the museum is not actively
seeking artifacts, this was a welcome surprise and
one we will treasure.
"I sit at my desk
each night with no place to go
opening the wrinkled maps of Milwaukee and Buffalo
the whole U.S.,
its cemeteries, its arbitrary time zones,
through routes like small veins, capitals like small stones."
- Excerpt from Sexton's poem And One For My Dame
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| Special Gift Book for New Chapter One Patrons now through October: A Journey Through Literary America
Author Thomas R. Hummel and photographer Tamra Dempsey are donating half the proceeds  from sales of their 304-page coffee table book to the American Writers Museum. The book features 26 American authors and the places that inspired them.
Treat yourself to this lovely book while helping to support AWM.
Special bonus now through October: Become a new Chapter Patron for $100 or more. We'll list you on the AWM website and express our appreciation by sending you a gift copy of the book, along with an AWM bookmark.
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From the beginning, AWM founders envisioned partnerships with authors' homes and museums across the country. AWM's Author Home/Museum Affiliate Program, developed to foster these connections, is building momentum. Twenty-two author homes are now AWM affiliates. Most recent to join: the Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library, the Margaret Mitchell Home and Museum, the Thomas Wolfe Memorial, and the Beauregard-Keyes House. There is no cost involved. AWM is adding a special section to its website to provide a literary map of American author homes. For more information on becoming an affiliate, contact Lynne Pace Robinson or Pam Buckles at general@americanwritersmuseum.org, or call 202.263.3330.
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| Spotlight On: The Emily Dickinson Museum
 The next time you're in Amherst, Massachusetts, plan to visit the Emily Dickinson Museum. The museum includes The Homestead, where the poet was born and lived most of her life. Just next door to Dickinson's home, is the Evergreens, the home of Dickinson's brother. Actress Julie Harris who died just a few weeks ago, played Dickinson in the original Broadway play The Belle of Amherst, based on Dickinson's life, and was an honorary chair of the museum. The museum is open from March through December. A short video introduction to the museum can be viewed here.
Click here for the museum website.
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AWM Contest: Name That Author
Who was the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and what was the name of the book for which she won?
Send your answers via email (with "AWM Contest" in the subject line and your answers in the email message) to general@americanwritersmuseum.org. Remember to include your name and contact information. We'll have a drawing of all those who submit the correct answers and the winner of the drawing will receive a $25 check.
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Follow us on Twitter: AmerWriterMuseum
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Please follow @AmerWriteMuseum to stay up-to-date on news about the American Writers Museum. We tweet links to other sites, quote American writers, note writers' birthdays, and share other literary items of interest. Follow us and join in the fun!
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Help Us Reach 1000 "Likes" on Facebook
 AWM is so close to reaching our 1,000 "likes" milestone on Facebook. Help us get there by visiting our page and clicking "like." You'll find interesting literary news stories and fun graphics as well as updates about AWM. Don't forget to share our site with fellow literature lovers! Like us on Facebook |
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