PRESS RELEASE: Ron Rash, ’76, N.C. Literary Hall of Fame Inductee, Returns for Program at Gardner-Webb University

Courtesy of the Gardner-Webb University Office of Communication & Media Relations

Award-Winning Author Offers Public Reading in Free Event for Campus and Community on Oct. 24.

BOILING SPRINGS, N.C.—Ron Rash, award-winning writer and professor, will return to Gardner-Webb University on the heels of his induction into the North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame. The ’76 alumnus will offer a public reading on Oct. 24 at 7 p.m. and take questions from the audience. The free event is open to the community and will be held in Tucker Student Center’s Stewart Hall.

Hosted by the Department of English Language and Literature, Rash’s visit is part of the Darlene J. Gravett Visiting Writer Series.

“We are thrilled to welcome Ron Rash back to campus,” said Chris Davis, chair of the Department of English. “It’s exciting to have Ron visit so soon after his Hall of Fame honor. His writing continues to be vital to the people of North Carolina, as he offers honest and meaningful portrayals of characters in the rural Appalachian region.”

Rash will discuss his most recent novel “The Caretaker” with first-year composition students at 3:30 p.m. in Stewart Hall. This event is an approved Dimensions event.

“The Caretaker,” published in 2023 and released in paperback in July 2024, is Rash’s eighth novel and 20th book overall. The love story is set in a small Appalachian town as it sends it sons to fight in the Korean War.

A poet and author, Rash was inducted into the North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame on Oct. 6 at the Weymouth Center for the Arts and Humanities in Southern Pines, N.C. The organization selects new members every two years, and Rash was one of five inductees. Rash’s Hall of Fame profile notes that he is praised for “his distinctive literary voice, consistent reexamination of regional stereotypes, and rendition of Appalachia’s buried history.” Read more, here.

Rash is the Parris Distinguished Professor in Appalachian Cultural Studies at Western Carolina University. He grew up in Boiling Springs and attended Crest High School before graduating from Gardner-Webb University with a bachelor’s degree in English. Rash’s father, James Rash, was an art professor at Gardner-Webb. He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Gardner-Webb in 2009.