Batavia-born novelist John Gardner will be celebrated with a night of readings, food and fun on Saturday, Oct. 27.
The John Gardner Society, in conjunction with Genesee Community College, is sponsoring the Halloween-themed celebration at 8 p.m. at the Pok-a-Dot diner at Ellicott and Liberty streets in Batavia.
Gardner, who died in a motorcycle crash near his Pennsylvania home in 1982, was a novelist, poet, critic and teacher, whose best known works include "The Sunlight Dialogues," a novel set in Batavia about brooding police chief Fred Clumly and his pursuit of a magician known as the Sunlight Man, and "Grendel," a retelling of the Beowulf legend from the monster's point of view.
He also penned three influential works on the art of writing: "On Becoming a Novelist," "The Art of Fiction," and "On Moral Fiction." For more information about the celebration, contact Bill Kauffman at (585) 757-2455 or GCC English Professor Charley Boyd at caboyd@genesee.edu.
You can also learn more about the writer by visiting the John Gardner Appreciation page on GCC's website: http://www.genesee.edu/gcc/gardner/.