News Releases

Clark College Welcomes a Literary Detective for the Ages

Author and professor Paul Collins will visit Clark on Wednesday, Feb. 10 
as guest lecturer in the 2009-2010 Columbia Writers Series

VANCOUVER, Wash. – Author and professor Paul Collins will be the next guest speaker in Clark College’s renowned Columbia Writers Series.  Collins will appear on Wednesday, Feb. 10 from noon to 1 p.m. in the Penguin Student Lounge, located in Clark’s Penguin Union Building.  The event is free and open to the public.

Clark College is located at 1933 Fort Vancouver Way, Vancouver.  Maps and driving directions are available at www.clark.edu/maps.

As a writer, Collins specializes in science history, memoir, and unusual antiquarian literature. His six books have been translated into 10 languages.  They include The Book of William: How Shakespeare's First Folio Conquered the World (2009), The Trouble with Tom: The Strange Afterlife and Times of Thomas Paine (2005), Not Even Wrong: A Father's Journey Into the Lost History of Autism (2004), Sixpence House: Lost in a Town of Books (2003), and Banvard’s Folly: Tales of Renowned Obscurity, Famous Anonymity and Rotten Luck (2002).

Collins is frequent contributor to the "Histories" column of New Scientist magazine.  His other recent freelance work includes essays for the New York Times, Slate, and The Believer. In addition to appearing regularly on NPR's Weekend Edition Saturday as its resident “literary detective” on odd and forgotten old books, he is also the founding editor of the Collins Library imprint of McSweeney's Books, where he has revived such disparate works as a World War I internment camp memoir (To Ruhleben and Back) and an absurdist 1934 detective tale (The Riddle of the Traveling Skull).

Paul Collins lives in Portland, Oregon, where he teaches creative nonfiction as an assistant professor in the master of fine arts (MFA) program at Portland State University.

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