NEWS

Presentation on Gaines center to show relevance to scholars

Feb 13, 2013 | General News, Liberal Arts

Fans of award-winning novelist Ernest Gaines will have an opportunity to attend a presentation at Louisiana Tech about the south Louisiana author’s legacy.
Matthew Teutsch, assistant to the director of the Ernest J. Gaines Center located at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, will discuss what the center has to offer scholars and students in the form of archival research. Teutsch’s presentation, which is hosted by Tech’s School of Literature and Language, will begin at 6 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 20 in Room 129 of George T. Madison Hall.
The Ernest J. Gaines Center houses more than 10,000 pages of manuscripts and other materials. The presentation will show the importance of Gaines’ work and how the center is in the process of digitizing the collection. Teutsch will provide examples of the materials housed at the center and will show what importance these materials have in the further study of Ernest J. Gaines’ legacy.
The center is an international center for scholarship on Ernest Gaines and his work. The center honors the work of UL Lafayette’s Writer-in-Residence Emeritus and provides a space for scholars and students to work with the Gaines papers and manuscripts.
Born in 1933 on a plantation near New Roads, Gaines based his award-winning novels on the African-American experience in the rural South. His works include “The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman” and “A Lesson Before Dying,” both later produced as award-winning films.
The presentation is open and free to the public.