RICHMOND — Celebrated author and social activist bell hooks along with best-selling novelist and environmental activist Silas House will address the 271 members of Berea College’s 142nd graduating class Saturday…
Silas House, a native of Lily, in Laurel County, has served as the National Endowment for the Humanities chair in Appalachian studies at Berea since 2010. He is an award-winning author of five best-selling novels: “Clay’s Quilt” (2001), “A Parchment of Leaves” (2003), “The Coal Tattoo” (2004), “Eli the Good” (2009) and “Same Sun Here” (co-authored with Neela Vaswani, 2012); three plays, “The Hurting Part” (2005), “Long Time Traveling” (2009), “This Is My Heart For You” (2012; premiered at Berea College); and “Something’s Rising” (2009), a creative nonfiction book about social protest co-authored with Jason Howard. House was selected to edit “Chinaberry” (2011), the posthumous manuscript of acclaimed writer James Still. He recently finished his novel “Little Fire,” which will be published in 2015.
House also is the recipient of numerous awards, both for his writing and social justice activism. His work has been published in The New York Times, Newsday, Sojourners, Oxford American and other publications. He is a former commentator for National Public Radio’s “All Things Considered.