UC San Diego Libraries Host
“An Evening with James Salter”
Distinguished Writer Will Speak after Welcoming Reception

January 30, 2007

By Paul K. Mueller

“An Evening with James Salter” at Geisel Library on the UCSD campus features the distinguished writer of novels, short stories and screen plays.

James Salter -- regarded as one of the finest living novelists and short-story writers by his literary peers – is the featured guest and speaker at the UC San Diego Libraries’ “An Evening with James Salter,” set for 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, 20 Feb., in the Geisel Library’s Seuss Room on campus.

The public is invited to attend the event, and media coverage is welcome.

According to Lynda Corey Claassen, director of the Mandeville Special Collections Library at UC San Diego, one of the event’s sponsors, Salter’s novels, short stories and screenplays put him in rarefied literary company. “Few American writers so consistently earn other writers’ praise,” she said. “Salter’s work has been called ‘some the most esteemed fiction of the last three decades.’”

Salter was born in 1926 and raised in New York City. After graduating from West Point in 1945, he entered the U.S. Army Air Force and served as a fighter pilot, flying more than one hundred combat missions during the Korean War. Following the publication of his first novel in 1957, Salter resigned his commission. He has earned his living as a writer ever since.

Salter has written five novels: The Hunter (1957), The Arm of Flesh (1961), A Sport and a Pastime (1967), Light Years (1975), and Solo Faces (1979); the screenplay Downhill Racer; and Dusk and Other Stories, a collection of short fiction that won the PEN/Faulkner Award in 1989. He has been awarded a grant from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters.

Media Contact: Paul K. Mueller, 858-534-8564
Comment: Lynda Corey Claassen, 858-534-1272