Professor Inspires Hopeful Writers

"I write non-fiction, and it's full of lies and distortions." Said Professor Sam Pickering, a noted essayist and UConn professor. This was the response he gave after an audience member asked him where the line of truth and fiction lay. He said there is no line. The professor's distinguished Southern accent, rang out through the Co-op Thursday night as he spoke about his works. He spoke on many subjects, reading excerpts from his book Autumn Spring, talking of things he had experienced, and even answered a few questions for aspiring writers.

"It was pretty inspiring as a writer," said Karina Manlove, a 5th-semester English and journalism double major.

The only knowledge many had of him before this was that he was inspired the dead poets society. Many of the audience members, some former students came to learn more about their professor.

Pickering also shared some funny interactions he has had with students through his years of teaching. One student got continuous zeros on his quizzes even though he insisted he did all the reading. Five weeks later the student figured out that he had picked up the wrong class list and had bought all the wrong books. When asked if he noticed that they never talked about the books he read in class the student said, "I'm a business major - I thought they might do it differently over here."

Pickering jokingly commented that undergrads are "to young to really know us, but nice."

The professor underscored through his whole speech that with age came knowledge and a unique outlook on life. He spoke about bringing humor into aging and how, past a certain age, everybody talks about health. One day, when he met two other men, they realized that "all three of us had hernias and we had a wonderful time talking about it."

In another story, he talked about how the nurse who was about to give him a colonoscopy had recognized that he worked at UConn. She told him that her daughter had taken his class and said she would tell her daughter that she saw her. "And she did," Pickering said.

He went on to talk about the little annoyances that everybody experiences in life like the health insurance company that continued to send his mother letters almost a decade after she died.

"[I said] her presence might have a pall on the audience [but] if they would fly her there and fly her back, [they could exhume her body]." Pickering joked. He also talked of lighter issues such as how taking off band-aids is like "the process of harvesting bushels of hair."

Noted for his frequent writing on the subject of animals, Pickering shared with the audience that the secret of writing about them is to have the right mixture of the hard stuff and sentimentality. When talking of the death of his dog, for example, Pickering was sure to not only write about the act of having the dog put down but also the humorous aspects. He joked how the day after he dug the grave, it flooded and his wife said that the dog would drown. Pickering responded with, "He's dead."

The professor ended the lecture with sharing how he writes many things down and is always on the lookout for more things to write about. "I have a lot of ideas in my essay, but here's what I do - I bury them."

The audience was kept amused and chucking all throughout his lecture.

Daniel Yepes, a 1st semester undecided major, said that the lecture was "extremely enjoyable."

"He's a great guy, and I want to take his class," Yepes said.

Contact Rachel Madariaga at Rachel.Madariaga

@UConn.edu.