Charles Johnson visiting campus tonight for the Heart River Writers' Circle

Award-winning author and cartoonist Dr. Charles Johnson will appear at Dickinson State University on Wednesday, April 5 at 8 p.m. in Beck Auditorium located in Klinefelter Hall as part of the Heart River Writers’ Circle. A reception and book signing will follow the reading.

During his presentation, Johnson will read from and discuss “Soulcatcher and Other Stories.” In this collection of 12 short stories, Johnson presents life during the era of African-American slavery. Writing from the perspective of a dozen different individuals in American history was an interesting assignment for the experienced author, who was asked to write the stories based on the PBS series “Africans in America: America’s Journey through Slavery.”

“Rarely is a writer given the opportunity (like an actor) to climb into the skin of both Frederick Douglass and Martha Washington, to descend into the fetid hold of a slave ship and join a nineteenth century slave revolt, to play Jefferson’s consul to Haiti and inhabit the psyche of both a runaway slave and his pursuer,” he wrote in his preface.

Johnson, who published his first novel in 1974, gained prominence when his novel “Middle Passage” won the National Book Award in 1990. Born in Evanston, Ill., Johnson began his career as a cartoonist and saw his work published by the time he was 17 years old. His two published collections of cartoons were acclaimed for their subtle but pointed satire of race relations and their success led to “Charlie’s Pad,” a 1971 series on public television that Johnson created, co-produced and hosted.

Johnson’s presentation is co-sponsored by Dickinson State University’s Theodore Roosevelt Honors Leadership Program as part of the Heart Rivers Writers’ Circle. The Writers’ Circle is sponsored by Stoxen Library and the Dickinson State University Department of Language and Literature through the use of university fees. The Circle brings in significant contemporary writers whose work interests a wide range of readers in the west river area. The group also involves faculty members, students, and area community members in follow-up discussions of books by featured writers.

Dr. Jim McWilliams, associate professor of English at DSU and author of “Passing the Three Gates: Interviews with Charles Johnson,” will lead a follow-up discussion on Johnson’s book of short stories April 20 at 7 p.m. in the Roosevelt Room at Stoxen Library.