Media report on new faculty position to honor Stephen King
The Associated Press, Reuters, Bangor Daily News, Maine Public Broadcasting Network and Portland Press Herald reported an endowed chaired professorship in literature named in honor of best-selling author and University of Maine alumnus Stephen King will be established at the University of Maine with the help of a $1 million award from the Harold Alfond Foundation. The Stephen E. King Chair in Literature will support a faculty position in the Department of English in honor of King’s “substantial body of work and creative impact.” The endowment for the faculty chair position, the first for the English Department, is held at the University of Maine Foundation. A search to fill the position is expected to begin this fall, and an event celebrating the King Chair is being planned for later this year. “Needless to say, I’m delighted and a little awestruck. It’s my alma mater, after all, and this is a high honor,” King said in an email to the BDN. UMaine hopes the newly endowed professorship will allow it to recruit an accomplished “teacher and a scholar of literature,” College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Dean Emily Haddad told the BDN. She said the position would help the English Department expand its role and influence in literature, creative writing and the humanities. “King is an inspiration for students who are fascinated by literature and its contributions to human culture,” Haddad said. “The opportunity to study with the King Chair gives them one more reason to choose UMaine.” ABC News, Fox News, The Washington Times, Boston.com, Las Vegas Sun, WCSH (Channel 6 in Portland) and WABI (Channel 5) carried the AP report. Yahoo News published the Reuters article.