Discover the inimitable Sanora Babb, an overlooked voice of midcentury American literature.

In Riding Like the Wind, Iris Jamahl Dunkle reconstructs the extraordinary life of Sanora Babb, a writer perhaps best known for her Dust Bowl novel Whose Names Are Unknown. Babb’s extensive field notes and oral histories of migrant farmworkers helped shape not only her work but also that of John Steinbeck in The Grapes of Wrath. Steinbeck’s novel, published first, overshadowed Babb’s which remained unpublished until 2004. Dunkle traces Babb’s journey from an impoverished childhood in Colorado to the literary circles of California, where she befriended Ray Bradbury, had a brief affair with Ralph Ellison, and was blacklisted by the House Un-American Activities Committee.

Drawing from the Library’s archives, Dunkle sheds new light on Babb’s relationship with Ellison, her competition with Steinbeck, and her connections with the literary greats of her time. Dunkle speaks about her book with author Emily Van Duyne.

To join | Please register for an In-Person Ticket. Doors will open around 1:30 PM. For free events, we generally overbook to ensure a full house. Priority will be given to those who have registered in advance, but registration does not guarantee admission. All registered seats are released shortly before start time, and seats may become available at that time. A standby line will form 30 minutes before the program.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Iris Jamahl Dunkle is an Emerita Poet Laureate of Sonoma County and a faculty member at UC Davis. She has authored two biographies: Charmian Kittredge London: Trailblazer, Author, Adventurer (University of Oklahoma Press, 2020) and Riding Like the Wind: The Life of Sanora Babb (University of California Press, 2024). Her fourth poetry collection, West : Fire : Archive, was recently published by The Center for Literary Publishing. Dunkle writes a weekly blog called Finding Lost Voices, which revives the voices of women who have been forgotten or misremembered and serves as the Poetry and Translation Director at the Napa Valley Writers' Conference. She’s on the board of the National Book Critics Circle.

Emily Van Duyne is the author of Loving Sylvia Plath: A Reclamation (W.W. Norton & Co., 2024) which was named a New Yorker Best Book of the Year, a "Book of the Year" by the Times Literary Supplement, and one of BookPage's 12 Best Biographies of the Year. The recipient of fellowships from the Fulbright and Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundations, and from Emory University, she is an Associate Professor of Writing at Stockton University, where she also chairs the Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program. With her colleagues Janet Badia and Julie Goodspeed-Chadwick, she is co-editing the forthcoming Routledge Companion to Sylvia Plath. She lives in New Jersey.

READ THE BOOK:

• Borrow: NYPL Catalog


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ACCESSIBILITY

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Iris Jamahl Dunkle © Theresa Sawyer
Courtesy Emily Van Duyne