NEWBERY MEDALIST PAULA FOX OPENS READING SERIES SEPT. 30

Newbery Medalist Paula Fox, who is noted both for her children's fiction and her adult literature, is giving a reading at Bryn Mawr College on Thursday, Sept. 30, at 7:30 p.m. in Thomas Great Hall. The reading is free and open to the public.

Fox's appearance opens a yearlong Creative Writing Program Reading Series featuring award-winning novelists, short-fiction writers and poets.

The 1984 recipient of both the Newbery Medal and Hans Christian Anderson Award for her children's historical novel, The Slave Dancer, Paula Fox made her writing debut in 1967 with Poor George, a story about a New York City teacher who takes in a local adolescent after the boy attempts to break into his home.

Fox's second novel, Desperate Characters, was made into a 1971 film starring Shirley MacLaine. Her memoir Borrowed Finery, published in 2001, describes her experiences growing up in a world of hardship and neglect — themes included in many of her children's novels.

In all, Fox has written six novels for adults and several short stories, all of which were out of print by 1992. In recent years her adult novels have been rediscovered. Fox is perhaps best known for more than two dozen children's books, including Maurice's Room and The One-Eyed Cat. Anita Silvey, editor of The Essential Guide to Children's Books and Their Creators, recently said of Fox's work that "her subject matter is quite extraordinary because there is no topic she won't address."

In an article in The Guardian, Silvey explains, Fox "always had her own voice and her own vision. And she's definitely among a handful of the finest writers of contemporary and historical fiction for children."

Fox's reading at Bryn Mawr is sponsored by the Lucy Martin Donnelly Women Writers Series Fund.

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