Reading: Dr. Oliver Sacks

Audio/Visual recording of Oliver Sacks reading at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference on Tuesday, March 25th, 2003. In this recording, Sacks reads "Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood".

Introduction by President Charles Kupchella.

Panel: Art & Science

Audio/Visual Recording of "Art & Science" panel discussion. The panel is comprised of Natalie Angier, Ted Mooney, Julia Whitty, and Dr. Oliver W. Sacks at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference on March 26, 2003.

Panel moderated by Jeanne Anderegg.

Reading: Julia Whitty

Audio/Visual recording of Julia Whitty reading at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference on March 26, 2003. In this reading, Whitty reads "Senti's Last Elephant" from A TORTOISE FOR THE QUEEN OF TONGA.

A transcription of this reading is available at http://www.undwritersconference.org/2003_Whitty.html

Presentation: Natalie Angier

Audio/Visual recording of Natalie Angier speaking at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference on March 24, 2003. In this presentation, Angier speaks on her favorite topic "the evolution of beauty." She begins by describing the general characteristics of beauty and its multiplicity of roles in nature. She moves on to examine the role fashion has on the evolutionary psychology of humans, focusing more specifically on hair. Afterwards, Angier answered questions touching on a range of subject such as the significant of beauty in culture, the roles of men and women, origins of beauty stereotypes, our attraction to art, genital mutilation, and future projects.

Panel: Science Fact/Science Fiction

Panel moderated by Al Fivizzani

Reading: Ted Mooney

Audio/Visual recording of Ted Mooney reading at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference on March 27, 2003. In this recording, Mooney reads the beginning of his novel EASY TRAVEL TO OTHER PLANETS.

Reading: Thomas Disch

Audio/Visual recording of Thomas M. Disch reading at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference: Art & Science on March 27, 2003. In this recording, Disch reads "Dreams: A Darwinian View" "Questions Your Children Are Certain to Ask" published in YES, LET’S: NEW AND SELECTED POEMS (1989). "Why the Sky is Blue" "What I Learned at MIT" "The Mini Verse" published only in NORTH DAKOTA QUARTERLY (2003). “A Letter to Robert Bly,” “Villanelle for Charles Olson,” “The Future of the Book,” published in THE CASTLE OF PERSEVERANCE: JOB OPPORTUNITIES IN CONTEMPORARY POETRY (POETS ON POETRY) (2002). “On the Use of Masculine Preferred,” published in A CHILDREN’S GARDEN OF GRAMMAR (1997). The main reading is the essay “The Future of the Book.” Disch’s essay is his speculation of what is going to happen to the process of book publication with the many developments in computer technology. He says, “I believe I am speaking and describing the world as it is.” “Soon there will be fewer and fewer books but more and more authors.”

Panel: Science as Cosmology

Audio/Visual recording of "Science as Cosmology" panel at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference on March 28, 2003. The panel is comprised of Alison Hawthorne-Deming, Pattiann Rogers, and Thomas Disch.

Panel moderated by Martha Potvin

Reading: Alison Hawthorne-Deming

Audio/Visual recording of Alison Hawthorne-Deming at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference on March 28, 2003. In this recording, Alison Hawthorne-Deming reads a total of five poems from her book THE MONARCHS: A POEM SEQUENCE and then gives a sample of her new book THE EDGES OF THE CIVILIZED WORLD: A JOURNEY IN NATURE AND CULTURE.

A transcription of this reading is available at http://www.undwritersconference.org/2003_HawthorneDeming.html

Reading: Pattiann Rogers

Audio/Visual recording of Pattiann Rogers reading at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference on March 25, 2003. In this recording, Rogers reads "Opus from Space" "The Significance of Location" "In Addition to Faith, Hope and Charity" "The Stars Beneath My Feet" "Alpha and Omega" "Place and Proximity" "When at Night" "Watching the Ancestral Prayers of Venerable Others" "The Pieces of Heaven" "Distance and Depth" "Hummingbird" "Justification of the Horned Lizard" and "The Greatest Grandeur."

A transcription of this recording is available at http://www.undwritersconference.org/Rogers_2003.html

Panel: Science and Poetry

Audio/Visual recording of "Science and Poetry" panel at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference on March 29, 2003. The panel is comprised of Alison Hawthorne-Deming, Pattiann Rogers, and Rafael Campo.

Panel moderated by Tami Carmichael

Reading: Devra Davis

Audio/Visual recording of Devra Lee Davis reading at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference on March 27, 2003. In this recording, Davis reads from WHEN SMOKE RAN LIKE WATER.

Reading: Rafael Campo

Audio/visual recording of Rafael Campo reading at the 34th Annual UND Writers Conference: Art & Science on March 29, 2003, introduced by Katie Rau. From LANDSCAPE WITH HUMAN FIGURE (2002), he reads “Questions for the Weather,” “Outside Fayetteville,” and “What I Would Give;” from THE OTHER MAN WAS ME: A VOYAGE TO THE NEW WORLD (1994), he reads “Aida,” and “The Distant Moon;” from WHAT THE BODY TOLD (1996), winner of a Lambda Literary Award, he reads “10 Patients and Another;” and from DIVA (1999), a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, he reads “The Changing Face Of Aids: 9. The Failure Of Empathy On Center Street” and “Last Rites.” Rafael Campo also reads the chapters “The Fairiest College” and “AIDS and the Poetry of Healing” from his memoir THE DESIRE TO HEAL: A DOCTOR’S EDUCATION IN EMPATHY, IDENTITY, AND POETRY (1997), which received a Lambda Literary Award for Memoir.