{"id":13748,"date":"2012-03-27T17:05:16","date_gmt":"2012-03-27T22:05:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/?p=13748"},"modified":"2014-09-23T08:33:20","modified_gmt":"2014-09-23T13:33:20","slug":"poet-creates-elvis-meets-einstein-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web20.olemiss.edu\/news\/wordpress\/poet-creates-elvis-meets-einstein-award\/","title":{"rendered":"Poet Creates Elvis Meets Einstein Award"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u2026 First recipients to read Thursday on radio show<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Charity is<\/em><\/p>\n

the only scam<\/em><\/p>\n

that makes me richer<\/em><\/p>\n

than I am.<\/em><\/p>\n

– By Poetry Bob with Elvis and the Einstein All Stars<\/p>\n

\"D.C.<\/a>

D.C. Berry<\/p><\/div>\n

OXFORD, Miss. \u2013 Most poets don’t drive Porsches, but Oxford resident D.C. Berry, a retired University of Southern Mississippi professor and acclaimed author of hundreds of poems and several volumes, could if he wanted to. He even came close to buying one last year after coming into some unexpected resources.<\/p>\n

Instead, Berry created the Elvis Meets Einstein Award Fund, which will provide income each year to two deserving students in the Department of English’s Master of Fine Arts program at the University of Mississippi. He hopes alumni and friends will step forward with gifts of their own to build the endowment from its present value of $63,000 to $100,000, with interest from the fund to be used for awards in an annual writing contest for prose and poetry.<\/p>\n

The first winners of the contest will be announced and read their pieces Thursday (March 29) during a 6:30 p.m. performance of the “Thacker Mountain Radio” program at Off Square Books, 129 Courthouse Square in Oxford.<\/p>\n

“I’ve needed a Porsche since I was 13,” said Berry, a three-time winner of the Excellence in Teaching Award and former poet at the Center for Writers at USM, which also honored him as the Charles W. Moorman Distinguished Professor in the Humanities. “But knowing I could have a brag ride to Kroger, I didn’t want one anymore, of course. The next best way to spend money for fun, fun, fun, I thought, was to give it to Ole Miss’ MFA program, one of the top 10 in the country.”<\/p>\n

And fun is what Berry \u2013 who has twice been recognized by the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters for his work \u2013 had in mind when he conceived of the award.<\/p>\n

“I was reading Albert Einstein quotations at the time, and they were funny,” he recalled. “Then Elvis’ song, ‘Burning Love,’ came on, and I thought, let’s just call it ‘Elvis Meets Einstein for Writing a Whole Lotta Funny and a Hunka Smart.’ That name would draw a lot of attention to the program. I wanted something that would resonate for as long as people know our friends Albert and Elvis.”<\/p>\n

For someone who taught poetry, Berry doesn’t take his craft too seriously. His humorously irreverent collection of verse, “Hamlet Off Stage,” re-imagined Shakespearean characters such as Laertes as a hipster in “skate-board clothes” and Horatio as a “brown-noser” who only contemplates suicide at the play’s end to score points with the audience. So it’s not surprising that Berry requires entries in the Elvis Meets Einstein Award writing contest to be “funny and smart” \u2013 not to mention concise, no more than one page in length.<\/p>\n

“Aspiring writers need to understand that their work is, above all, a form of entertainment,” Berry said. “It has to draw in the reader from the first line because there are so many types of entertainment now, and the writer must realize he’s in competition with everyone from Rush Limbaugh to Benny Hinn. If you give (a young writer) $3,000 for writing one page that’s funny and smart, he or she will find an audience.”<\/p>\n

Berry brought his idea for the award and contest to Beth Ann Fennelly, a UM associate professor of English and director of the MFA Program.<\/p>\n

“Of course, I was thrilled, and we met with the good folks in (the UM Foundation),” said Fennelly, an award-winning poet in her own right who earned a Fulbright Award in 2009. “Sometimes these things take years to put together, but D.C. Berry has tremendous energy, and we managed to create the award in time to offer it this spring.”<\/p>\n

Fennelly said there is a “dire need” for this type of funding for MFA students.<\/p>\n

“Our hardworking MFAs are amazing,” she said. “They take three classes a semester and teach one or two classes a semester, and all the while they’re writing a book-length thesis \u2013 and they’re making $10,250 a year. It’s remarkable, but they are driven and immensely hungry for what our program can offer them. D.C. was impressed by their output and found a creative way to encourage them. It’s truly kind and generous of him.”<\/p>\n

Neil White, an Oxford-based publisher and author of the bestselling nonfiction book, “In the Sanctuary of Outcasts,” served as a judge for the inaugural contest.<\/p>\n

Berry felt White would be “the absolutely perfect judge because he writes and publishes but it’s not fiction or poetry. He’s just the ideal reader.”<\/p>\n

The Elvis Meets Einstein Award Fund is open to receive gifts from individuals and organizations by sending a check to the UM Foundation, P.O. Box 249, University, MS 38677 or by visiting http:\/\/www.umfoundation.com\/makeagift.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2026 First recipients to read Thursday on radio show Charity is the only scam that makes me richer than I am. – By Poetry Bob with Elvis and the Einstein All Stars OXFORD, Miss. \u2013 Most poets don’t drive Porsches, but Oxford resident D.C. Berry, a retired University of Southern Mississippi professor and acclaimed authorRead the story …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13750,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,460],"tags":[458,459],"yoast_head":"\nPoet Creates Elvis Meets Einstein Award - Ole Miss News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/news.olemiss.edu\/poet-creates-elvis-meets-einstein-award\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Poet Creates Elvis Meets Einstein Award - Ole Miss News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u2026 First recipients to read Thursday on radio show Charity is the only scam that makes me richer than I am. – By Poetry Bob with Elvis and the Einstein All Stars OXFORD, Miss. \u2013 Most poets don’t drive Porsches, but Oxford resident D.C. 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