Former President George W. Bush.By Chauncey Mabe
The economy may still look scary, but for South Florida’s four major literary festivals, there will be no double-dip recession. Learning from last year’s challenges, each plans robust programs for the serious and casual book lover over the coming season.
Take Miami Book Fair International (Nov. 14-21), the region’s oldest and biggest literary festival, and the first one on the calendar. Last year, says Alina Interian, executive director, fair organizers found they could do away with some longstanding features, such as the Street Fair parade, and still preserve the essence of the event.
“We constantly monitor our budget to stay cost-effective,” Interian says. “Public funding continues to be limited. Corporate support has improved some, but not as much as we’d like. We’re counting on individual support, vendor and exhibitor fees and admission fees. Thank God for Miami-Dade College, which is our backbone.”
Even with money constraints, however, the book fair will still feature 300 national and international authors. And if anything, the roster (still evolving in late summer/early fall) is more impressive than ever.
Jonathan Franzen.“An Evening with George Bush” opens the fair, less than a week after the publication of the former president’s highly anticipated memoir, Decision Points. The fair has also snagged literary It-Boy, Jonathan Franzen, whose Freedom is the most hotly debated American novel in years.
Other prominent figures on the schedule: Patti Smith, whose rock memoir Just Kids received rave reviews earlier this year; biologist E.O. Wilson, a two-time Pulitzer-winning science writer; Dave Eggers, novelist, nonfiction writer, publisher, screenwriter, and all-around 21st-century literary renaissance man.
Interian says one item dropped last year – the international pavilion – is returning. But instead of a “village,” with several countries represented, this year’s fair will focus on just one: Mexico.
Mitchell Kaplan, one of the fair’s founders, says a number of Mexican writers and political figures will be on hand, including Carlos Fuentes – who, as a leading Latin American novelist and former ambassador to Britain and France, qualifies as both.
And after a year off, the Rock Bottom Remainders returns. For the uninitiated, that’s the garage band featuring authors like Stephen King, Dave Barry and Amy Tan.
“It’s a good one this year,” Kaplan says of the fair. “Be there or be square.”
In Key West, where the annual literary seminar will celebrate the literature of food, executive director Miles Frieden joked in early September that he was beginning to panic. After many years of early sell-outs, last year’s registrations lagged well into the fall before picking up again.
“We seem to be in the same straits this year,” Frieden says. “We’re not immune from the economy.”
Contributing to Frieden’s nerves is the decision to hold two sessions, one Jan. 6-9, and a second Jan. 13-16. As of early September, neither session was full, though the first will certainly sell out, Freiden says. (For information, see http://www.kwls.org/lit/2011/.)
“We don’t make the decision to do double sessions lightly,” Frieden says. “It’s a risk for us. But when we turn away our regulars because we’ve sold out, they beat up on me and I get bruised.”
Ruth Reichl.Intimate and casual, the Key West Literary Seminar remains a bargain at $495. This year’s list of authors includes Ruth Reichl, Calvin Trillin, Billy Collins, Frank Bruni, Roy Blount Jr., Diana Abu-Jabr, Elizabeth Berg, Mark Kurlansky, and many others.
Freiden concedes the topic – formal title: The Hungry Muse: An Exploration of Food in Literature – is a bit lighter than usual.
“I fear some people may stay away because they think the topic is frivolous,” he explains. “This may not be the most literary thing we’ve ever done, but I say it’s the most literary food thing ever done.”
But the main reason for slow registrations, Frieden says, is the obvious one.
“I think we’ll be fine, it’s just making me nervous. But I guess a lot of people are nervous.”
Robert Pinsky.Last year’s Palm Beach Poetry Festival may have been a success – the workshops sold out and the public readings were well-attended – but that doesn’t mean founding director Miles Coon isn’t making refinements.
In response to an online survey of last year’s participants, Coon is adding more craft lectures and more opportunities for featured poets to participate in educational events.
“We’ve added value and didn’t raise our tuition rates,” Coon says. “Our numbers of applications to date are almost twice what they were last year at this time.”
Held in Delray Beach from Jan 17-22, the festival’s biggest name this season is former U.S. poet laureate Robert Pinsky. Award-winning spoken-word poets D. Blair and Taylor Mali are also featured readers.
The workshop faculty includes Thomas Lux, Heather McHugh, Jane Hirschfield, C.D. Wright, Dean Young, Stuart Dischell, V.J. Seshadri and Ellen Bryant Young, all of whom will also take part in public readings and panel discussions.
Registration closes Nov 2 (visit www.palmbeachpoetryfestival.org/apply/guidelines). Full registration is $725, while auditor’s registration is $350 – an increasingly popular choice, says Coon, for beginning poets, who get to sit on lectures and workshop without having to submit their poems to scrutiny.
Big changes, too, are planned for Literary Feast, Fort Lauderdale’s major literary festival – but they are mostly of a scheduling variety.
LitLive! the day of free lectures and readings at Nova Southeastern University, will be held on Sunday instead of Saturday, and start at 12:30 p.m. instead of 10 a.m.
“We hope to target some of the younger college students who don’t get up on Saturday morning,” says Natasha Rogers, special events coordinator for the Broward County Public Library Foundation.
The Night of Literary Feasts will remain on Saturday night, where it moved last year after more than two decades as a Friday event. These scheduling changes save money on airfare – more than 20 authors fly in to participate – without diminishing the scope of the festival, Rogers says.
Jane Velez-Mitchell.Literary Feast takes place March 26-27. Attendance at the Sunday lectures is free. Tickets for Night of Literary Feast are $150 each. Only two authors – Headline News anchor Jane Velez-Mitchell and Elizabeth Nunez, author of the novel Anna In Between, are confirmed.
But many more will join them over the next few months Last year’s event included such luminaries as Elizabeth Kostova, Russell Banks, Achy Obeyas and Lisa See. Check the Website – www.literaryfeastonline.org – for developments.