Thank you for coming tonight for the reading
by Daniyal Mueenuddin.
He's our third reader of the 2011-2012 prose series.
Before I give you the pleasure of hearing Daniyal read,
I'd like to thank the English department for funding
the prose series, and the Poetry Center, Gail Brown and Cybele
and Bonnie Jean and Annie, all of who
helped us so much in putting together all of our events,
and thank them too, for generously housing our authors
and giving us this great space for the readings.
Thanks too, to our co-sponsors, the Center for Middle Eastern
Studies and the College of Humanities.
Daniyal Mueenuddin's debut collection of stories,
"In Other Rooms, Other Wonders," was
published in 22 countries in 19 languages.
It was the winner of the Story Prize for 2009,
the 2010 Rosenthal Family Foundation
award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters,
and the 2010 Commonwealth Writers Prize.
The collection was one of three finalists for the 2010 Pulitzer
Prize, a finalist for the 2009 National Book Awards,
the LA Times First Fiction Award, and the Ondaatje Prize.
It was voted Top 10 Books of the Year
by Publishers Weekly, The Economist, and Time Magazine,
and Best Books of the Year by the Guardian and the New
Statesman.
His stories have been selected for Best American short stories
and the PEN/O Henry Prize Stories.
Daniyal Mueenuddin is a graduate of Dartmouth College,
Yale Law School, and the graduate program
in creative writing here at the University of Arizona.
One of the great pleasures of introducing authors
whose work you revere is a chance to read
not only the accolades that have been bestowed on the author,
but a few lines from the author to whet the reader's appetite.
So I just want to read one paragraph, because it's fun.
"When I drove through the gate of my house, a sagging
wooden affair once painted green,
once perhaps, in colonial days, a swing
for little English children, I found an old man standing
by the portico with the timeless patience
of peasants and old servants, as if he had been standing there
all day.
He wore a battered white skullcap, soiled clothes,
a sleeveless sweater, and shoes with crepe rubber soles worn
down on one side, which gave each foot a peculiar tilt.
The deep lines on his face ran in no rational order, no order
corresponding to musculature or to emotions
through which his expressions might pass,
but spread from numerous points.
The oversized head had settled heavily
onto the shoulders like a sandcastle on the beach
after the sea has run over it.
That's why we're here.
Daniyal graduated from the University of Arizona MFA
program in 2004.
He was my student during his days
here, though it might be more appropriate to say
I was one of Daniyal's readers.
His work knocked the socks off the members
of the creative writing faculty, not just the fiction faculty,
but the entire faculty.
Since those days, he's been compared
to Turgenev and Chekhov.
I felt very lucky to be the advisor on his MFA manuscript.
During his manuscript semester, he
would bring me a story to read.
And then after I'd had a chance to read it,
he'd come by my office.
And I praised the beauty and intelligence
that was present in every one of the stories
and make suggestions for editing the piece.
And Daniyal would nod and smile his charming smile.
Then he'd bring me another story.
And I'd say wonderful, wonderful,
and make some suggestions.
And he'd nod and smile.
And he wrote a whole lot while he was here.
It was no surprise to me to open the New
Yorker a couple of years ago and find Daniyal's stories.
I knew.
I think that we all knew that he would be publishing.
What did surprise me was the depth of my response
to the stories.
I'm sure that all of you know--
I'm getting a little choked up because it
was a very, very deep response.
I'm sure all of you know the satisfaction that comes
after you finish a great story.
Then there's the real joy that comes on those rare occasions
when you read story after story by a particular writer
and you feel, here's someone I will want
to read the rest of your life.
That's how I felt when I read this book.
Thanks, Daniyal.