Published: September 14, 2007 11:40 pm      

Professor wins literary award

An Eastern Kentucky University professor has earned the AE Coppard Prize for fiction for her 33-page first novella “Mad Dog.”

Kathy Flann, assistant professor in EKU’s Department of English and Theatre and coordinator of the university’s Master of Fine Arts Program in Creative Writing, received a $500 prize for her story about a young Virginia man who studies abroad in Great Britain and becomes an instant celebrity there after punctuating every correct answer on a TV quiz show with a distinctive howl.

“The original idea for the story came when I was living in England,” she said. “Someone told me about a guy who had been arrested in a pub for biting a woman on the rear end. I tried to write a story about it. In the story, the guy’s nickname became ‘Mad Dog.’

“But, it was hard to create a sympathetic character who went around biting people,” Flann said. “So, later I changed the story completely. He earned his nickname by howling instead of biting. I think maybe the story was recognized with the award because the content is so quirky. It would be hard to confuse this story with any other in terms of the scenario.”

A Virginia native, Flann joined the EKU faculty in 2006 after serving from 2001 as the program director in creative writing in the School of Culture, Media and Environment at St. Martin’s College in Lancaster, England.

She also has taught at Eureka College in Illinois and the University of North Carolina—Greensboro.

Flann earned her bachelor’s degree in English from Virginia Tech University, a master’s degree in English from Auburn University and a master’s of fine arts degree in creative writing from the UNC-Greensboro.

“Mad Dog” will be published in November by White Eagle Coffee Store Press, whose editor first informed Flann about her winning the award after she returned home from a trip to England.

“I phoned him hoping like crazy that it was good news,” she said about receiving several urgent e-mails from the editor. “I was delighted when he asked me if the story was still available and told me that it had won the contest.

“It’s really hard to find places to publish stories that are more than 20 pages long,” Flann said. “So, I felt pretty lucky. Literary journals only accept less than 1 percent of the submissions they receive, and they receive thousands. So, the odds are long anyway. If the story is over 20 pages, your odds are even lower. So this contest was a rare opportunity.”

The current version of “Mad Dog” started to take shape in the fall 2005 and Flann unsuccessfully sent it out to magazines.

In the fall of 2006, she received some feedback from a colleague, redrafted it and sent it out again.

Flann previously had been a finalist three times for national awards for collections of short stories before this year’s breakthrough.

She also has had 11 short stories published in nationally distributed literary magazines and anthologies.

“I do have a book manuscript — a collection of short stories — which has been a finalist numerous times for national awards,” Flann said.

“I’m still sending out the collection of short stories to publishers and contests,” she said. “In the meantime, I’ve been working on some rough ideas for a novel and also possibly a memoir.”

As for why “Mad Dog” was chosen for the award, Flann said she likes to think that it is funny.

“Some people think so anyway,” she said. “And, it’s about a guy struggling to define his concept of home. That’s something people might relate to.”

Bryan Marshall can be reached at bmarshall@richmondregister.com or 624-6691.