Happy New Year to you all!

FOSEL is delighted to kick off its 2011 program, "The South End Writes," with nationally recognized author Doug Bauer. The South End resident, who is currently a Professor of Literature at Bennington College, will read a personal essay from a forthcoming collection on Tuesday evening, January 25 at 6:30 PM. The event is free and includes refreshments.

FOSEL's monthly series at the South End Library began last fall with author Sue Miller, reading from her recent book The Lake Shore Limited, and continued with other local authors, including Phil Gambone (Travels in a Gay Nation: Portraits of GLBTQ Americans); Scott Pomfret (Since My Last Confession, a Gay Catholic Memoir) and Alison Barnet, who writes about the "old" South End for the South End News.

Doug Bauer’s books include the novels, Dexterity, The Very Air, and The Book of Famous Iowans, and the non-fiction books, Prairie City, Iowa and The Stuff of Fiction. He’s also edited two anthologies, Prime Times: Writers on Their Favorite Television Shows and Death by Pad Thai and Other Unforgettable Meals. A personal essay by Bauer, entitled "What We Hunger For," was included in Best Food Writing 2009, a Da Capo Press anthology.

Bauer has received grants in both fiction and non-fiction from the Massachusetts Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts, most recently in January 2010 when the NEA awarded him $25,000 in support of his ongoing work in contemporary literature. His stories and essays have appeared in Esquire, The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic, Harper’s, Sports Illustrated, Tin House, Agni, and many other magazines. Bauer has worked as a magazine editor and for several years as a free-lance journalist before returning to academic life, earning a Doctor of Arts degree from the State University of New York, Albany. He has taught at Harvard