Alison Lurie offers comic relief in yesterday's Times Union

State Author Offers Comic Relief

by Paul Grondahl

ALBANY — If novelist Alison Lurie takes out her needles and yarn during the speechifying at the state author and state poet awards on Thursday at a Writers Institute program, take it as a sign that even the honoree is bored.

Knitting was Lurie's silent protest against the gasbags who droned on during English department faculty meetings at Cornell University, where she taught writing and children's literature for nearly 40 years.

More in the TU:  http://www.timesunion.com/local/article/State-author-offers-comic-relief-3878975.php

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Alison Lurie on the Language of Fashion

"My clothes are making a statement and that statement might be making you feel uncomfortable," Lurie said after she appeared on stage wearing a head scarf and a raincoat. "The unconsciously learned rules of fashion tell you to try to interpret why I am wearing this costume and to make sense of it." (From the Cornell Chronicle, July 1997).

In addition to being a Pulitzer-winning novelist and a scholar of childrens literature, Alison Lurie, our new New York State Author is a recognized authority on the meaning and symbolism of clothing.

You are cordially invited to attend Lurie's inauguration at Page Hall on Thursday, Sept. 20 at 8PM. Head scarf and raincoat optional.

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Disguising Ithaca

Alison Lurie, our new State Author who will be inaugurated at Page Hall on Thursday 9/20, talks to the Gannett new service about disguising her hometown of Ithaca, NY and Cornell University, her longtime employer, in her novels:

“I called it a different name because if I wanted to move the buildings around, it wouldn’t be so difficult,” Lurie said. “And I didn’t want people to say, ‘What professor is this?’ Of course, they did anyway. But I tried so hard not to make it anyone I knew.”

More.

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