The Eudora Welty Foundation Lecture

Find out what drives author Elizabeth Strout, when she joins with the Folger and the Eudora Welty Foundation to receive the 2023 Eudora Welty Prize. Staged at Washington DC’s famed National Press Club, Elizabeth Strout will present her lecture after receiving the Award. Ann Patchett, who received the Award in 2022, will present Elizabeth with the Welty Prize. Elizabeth Strout will sign books after the discussion. We invite you into this intimate moment steeped in literary history.

Elizabeth Strout is widely known for her works in literary fiction and her descriptive characterization. She was born and raised in Portland, Maine which has served as inspiration for her novels–the fictional “Shirley Falls, Maine” is the setting of four of her seven novels. Strout’s novels include Amy and Isabelle, Abide with Me, Olive Kitteridge for which she won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, The Burgess Boys, My Name Is Lucy Barton, Anything is Possible, and Olive, Again. Her latest book Oh, William! was just published.

Ann Patchett is the author of seven novels: The Patron Saint of Liars, Taft, The Magician’s Assistant, Bel Canto, Run, State of Wonder, and Commonwealth. She was the editor of Best American Short Stories, 2006, and has written three books of nonfiction—Truth & Beauty, about her friendship with the writer Lucy Grealy; What Now?, an expansion of her graduation address at Sarah Lawrence College; and This is the Story of a Happy Marriage, a collection of essays examining the theme of commitment. In 2019, she published her first children’s book, Lambslide, illustrated by Robin Preiss Glasser.