Though there’s no Salman Rushdie on this semester’s Caught in the Creative Act docket, there are plenty of other notable writers scheduled for Janette Turner Hospital’s signature series.

Having recently released the schedule for the popular book club/lecture series that is free and open to the public, Hospital says she expects three evenings to test Gambrell Hall’s capacity.

“Rushdie was a once-in-a-course-history event,” Hospital says of the lecture that drew some 800 or so people earlier this spring. “But I still think three of our authors this year will be standing-room-only affairs: Daniel Mendelsohn, Richard Ford and Jane Hamilton.

“Mendelsohn is a very scholarly person — he teaches the classics at Princeton,” Hospital says. “But his book The Lost, about him trying to find out about family members lost in the Holocaust, really is amazing in the sense that on one level it’s a gripping detective novel as he tracks all these people down, and on another it’s fascinating in that he does a whole riff on the Jewish scholarly tradition of the Talmud and sibling rivalry that goes from Cain and Abel to his own family.”

Like Rushdie, Joyce Carol Oates and other famous authors who have come for the series, Hospital says Mendelsohn, whose book has won the National Book Critics Circle Award, couldn’t say no.

“I was speaking to him at the Sydney International Literary festival, and as I always do I waited until the social aspect to bring up the subject of the course: When you’re asking people to come for significantly less than they’d make otherwise, it helps to have them relaxed.

“But when he found out about how important I believe it is to make that town-gown connection, he was so enthusiastic about it. He’s just as passionate about linking the ivory tower with the community.”

Hospital says Ford, whose book Independence Day won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, already knew about the series from other authors.

“I also crossed paths with Richard in Sydney, and when I mentioned the series he said he’d heard about it, it sounded great and he would love to be invited,” Hospital says. “I think he has the pulse of America in the late 20th and early 21st centuries calibrated. I’m looking forward to Richard coming.”

The third author, Hamilton, has had her book promoted on The Oprah Winfrey Show.

“Jane’s is such a harrowing book,” Hospital says. “Everyone has seen her on Oprah, and the book itself is one every family can identify with: what happens when something beyond your control happens, some ghastly intrusion of harm that you’re forced to negotiate. You just have your heart in your mouth as you read it.”

Fans of South Carolina literature will recognize the name of Josephine Humpreys of Charleston, whose novel Rich in Love, set in the Lowcountry, was made into a major motion picture.

The Caught in the Creative Act series runs for six weeks, with two evening sessions per week: Mondays and Wednesdays from 5:45 to 7 p.m. at the Gambrell Hall Auditorium. Though registration is not required to attend the Wednesday lecture series, it is required for the Monday courses, and seating preferences go to registered members.  

To register, call 777-9064 or email Nancy Brock at br8nan@aol.com. For more information or to hear podcasts from previous series, visit cas.sc.edu/cica.

Caught in the 
Creative Act

All events at USC’s Gambrell Hall

Josephine Humphreys’ Rich in Love
Lecture Oct. 13, author visit Oct. 15

Daniel Mendelsohn’s The Lost
Lecture Oct. 20, author visit Oct. 22

Richard Ford’s The Lay of the Land
Lecture Oct. 27, author visit Oct. 29

Valerie Miner’s After Eden
Lecture Nov. 3, visit Nov. 5

Sophie Gee’s The Scandal of the Season
Lecture Nov. 10, visit Nov. 12

Jane Hamilton’s A Map of the World
Lecture Nov. 17, visit Nov. 19