{"id":5677,"date":"2020-11-06T09:00:42","date_gmt":"2020-11-06T14:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/?p=5677"},"modified":"2020-11-06T07:37:45","modified_gmt":"2020-11-06T12:37:45","slug":"a-virtual-visit-from-dr-sofia-samatar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/?p=5677","title":{"rendered":"A Virtual Visit From Dr. Sofia Samatar"},"content":{"rendered":"

Written by Jasey Roberts<\/em><\/p>\n

On Oct. 22, critically acclaimed writer Dr. Sofia Samatar spoke via Zoom to an audience of Roanoke College students and faculty. Dr. Samatar, a professor of English from James Madison University, is best known for her work in the realm of short fiction. Her 2017 collection \u201cTender\u201d made NPR\u2019s best books list of that year, writing that \u201cTender\u201d \u201credefines the emotional power and literary heft that speculative fiction can convey.\u201d Samatar is also known for her illustrated collection of \u201cMonster Portraits,\u201d which she wrote in collaboration with her brother Del Samatar.<\/span><\/p>\n

Over a hundred different people from four different countries attended the webinar. Dr. Samatar read from one of her short stories, \u201cSelkie Stories Are for Losers,\u201d as well as some of the profiles featured in \u201cMonster Portraits.\u201d During the Q&A portion of the event, Dr. Samatar expressed her beliefs regarding \u201cthe writing life\u201d – \u201cI read at least twice as much as I write, so I\u2019m lucky if I get to write for thirty minutes a day. My advice for aspiring writers would be to read a lot, and to read everything – really just be an omnivorous reader.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

When asked about whether or not she writes her stories to anyone in particular, Dr. Samatar said, \u201cI definitely think it\u2019s mostly important to amuse yourself when first writing a story, but it is also equally as important to have your narrator – or whoever\u2019s telling the story – have a reason for doing so.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

RC\u2019s own Dr. Almeder, who acted as an MC for the event, commented that, \u201cSamatar was such a generous and authentic speaker. We were lucky to have someone of her wild talent and international stature visit us, even virtually, at Roanoke College to read from her most recent work and to discuss her writing life. Her writing is fearless, surprising, and utterly fresh. She writes the fantasy form as a way to seek the truth about some of the most crucial experiences of the 21st century.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

During the event, when asked about that very interest in speculative fiction and the fantastic, Dr. Samatar smiled and said, \u201cI\u2019ve just always been interested in it. It\u2019s weird – I get asked this question a lot, and I think that it\u2019s kind of unfair. Instead of \u2018why fantasy?\u2019 I\u2019d almost rather ask \u2018why realism?\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Written by Jasey Roberts On Oct. 22, critically acclaimed writer Dr. Sofia Samatar spoke via Zoom to an audience of Roanoke College students and faculty. Dr. Samatar, a professor of English from James Madison University, is best known for her work in the realm of short fiction. Her 2017 collection \u201cTender\u201d made NPR\u2019s best books […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":5678,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[10],"class_list":["post-5677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-summer2019"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/Pic-for-Sofia-Samatar-article.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5677","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5677"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5677\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5678"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brackety-ack.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}