Join us for this collaborative reading series featuring faculty from the Minnesota Northwoods Conference and writers chosen by the Creative Writing Program at Columbus State University!

This past April, the Minnesota Northwoods Writers Conference staff decided to move the conference from the northwoods to an online format for the safety of our communities in this global COVID pandemic. We thoughtfully redesigned the conference for online delivery, and we brought our conference community together virtually despite the pandemic. We were also able to offer our Evening Reading Series to the public via Zoom. After the MNWC's success in pivoting to a remote conference in June, it became clearer that little could stop writers from coming together.

Earlier this fall, Dr. Allen Gee, the Donald L. Jordan endowed professor at Columbus State University, approached MNWC about collaborating to host an online reading series to reach both our communities and beyond.

Donald L. Jordan, a prominent Columbus businessman, is responsible for the Donald L. Jordan Endowed professorship at CSU. The endowment provides annual service trips abroad for ten undergraduate students, funding for a writing conference, and is responsible for the Donald L. Jordan Prize for Literary Excellence, a $10,000 annual award which includes a publication contract under a new imprint, DLJ Books. Mr. Jordan has always loved the arts, and in particular, painting and writing. He published two novels this past year, Negative Space, and Fearfully & Wonderfully Made, and continues to write whenever time allows.