Kentucky Author Ed McClanahan to Give Reading

COLUMBIA, Ky. -- One of Kentucky's more delightful and entertaining authors will give a talk and reading Tuesday night at Lindsey Wilson College.

Novelist and essayist Ed McClanahan will talk about and give a reading from his latest book, I Just Hitched in from the Coast. Published last year, the book is a collection of some of the author's more popular works.

McClanahan will give the talk at 7 p.m. CT in W.W. Slider Humanities Center Recital Hall. It is free and open to the public.

Known for his rollicking, good-naturedly crude humor and a creatively extensive vocabulary, McClanahan -- along with contemporary authors Wendell Berry, Bobbie Ann Mason, Gurney Norman the late James Baker Hall -- is considered a member of the "Fab Five" group of Kentucky writers who emerged in the 1960s and '70s.

A native of Brooksville, Ky., McClanahan earned degrees from Miami (Ohio) University and the University of Kentucky. He has taught English and creative writing at Oregon State University, Stanford University, the University of Montana, UK and Northern Kentucky University.

McClanahan received a prestigious Wallace Stegner Fellowship to Stanford University, where he was known by the nickname "Captain Kentucky." While at Stanford, McClanahan became good friends with author Ken Kesey, becoming an active member of Kesey's band of Merry Pranksters. His memoir, Famous People I Have Known, recollects many of his Prankster experiences.