This year’s dates are Wednesday, December 6th, through Sunday, December 10th. The primary venue is the National Literary Landmark, Hotel Monteleone, 200 Royal Street, (504) 529-5333.
The overall theme is War & Collateral Damage as Inspiration for the Arts.
Wednesday, December 6, 2017
INSPIRING YOUNG WRITERS, CREATING DEDICATED READERS FOR THE FUTURE
10:45 a. m. — The Cabildo, St. Peter St. at Jackson Square
Master Class for Students & Teachers
Presentation of the winner and runner-up of the High School Short Story category of the William Faulkner – William Wisdom Creative Writing Competition by this year’s judge, novelist George Bishop, Jr. Our Master for 2017 is Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Olen Butler. RSVPs required as a box lunch will be provided.
Thursday, December 7, 2017
WELCOME TO WORDS & MUSIC: NEW ORLEANS, MON AMOUR
8:00 a. m. — East Mezzanine, Hotel Monteleone (Outside Queen Anne Ballroom)
REGISTRATION DESK OPEN
Registered guests may pick up registration envelopes and programs or register here.
8:00 a. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom, Hotel Monteleone
CAFÉ AU LAIT & CROISSANTS
Continental breakfast is served daily from 8 a. m. to 10 a.m.
8:30 a. m. — Queen Anne Parlor, Adjacent to Queen Anne Ballroom
BOOK MART OPENS
Faulkner House Books, an independent book store and underwriter of the Pirate’s Alley Faulkner Society is owned by Joseph J. DeSalvo, Jr., Co-Founder of the Faulkner Society.
Author signings will take place in the Book Mart after discussion sessions.
WELCOME & ANNOUNCEMENTS
8:30 a. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
Faulkner Society/Words & Music Co-Founder Rosemary James and others will welcome guests
9:00 a. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
A LOUISIANA LITERARY HERO
New Orleans, Mon Amour… …is our annual tribute to a great man of letters who lived in Louisiana for all of his writing career, Walker Percy, author of the Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Moviegoer and other distinguished works of fiction, along with numerous carefully crafted, philosophical musings, including his essay, “New Orleans, Mon Amour.” Rod Dreher, the New York Times bestselling autho of The Little Way of Ruthie Leming and The Benedict Option, and programming director of the Walker Percy Weekend, will be with us to talk about the genius of Walker Percy and tell us about the Percy Weekend.
NEW ORLEANS, MON AMOUR: FICTION
9:15 a. m. — Joyce Blaylock, author of the monumental Southern epic Adelicia, will be discussing the New Orleans side of her book and the importance of getting the historic context right to any successful fiction set in the past.
9:30 a. m. — Patty Friedmann, one of our city’s very best writers, will be presenting her new new novel, An Organized Panic, another great treatise on disfunctional family relationships with Patty’s characteristic fine, wry humor mixed with pathos.
Intermission
Authors will sign in the Book Mart.
NEW ORLEANS, MON AMOUR: HISTORY
10:00 a. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
In Preparation for the city’s Tri-Centennial Celebration . Nancy Dixon, Ph.D, is Executive Editor of the New Orleans Tricentennial book, New Orleans and the World, a great summation of life in one of the world’s great cities by one of the city’s great historians. Nancy will present anecedotes from her new book and zero in on wars which have impacted New Orleans.
10:15 a. m.
Memorial to Michael Murphy & Presentation of his New Book, All Dat…
…written in anticipation of the city’s Tri-Centennial Celebration in 2018. All Dat is the last in a series of highly entertaining and informative guide books about the history and lifestyles offered to New Orleanians and their visitors.
10:30 a. m. — Queen Anne Parlor Intermission
Signing in the Book Mart by Nancy Dixon; Friends of Michael Murphy will be available to sign for him.
NEW ORLEANS, MON AMOUR: MEMOIR
11: 00 a. m. A Book Club Founded in Post Katrina Desperation Inspires Literary Art. New Orleanian Anne Gisleson, will present her debut book, The Futilitarians.
11:15 a. m.
Confessions of a New Orleans Bad Boy and Bon Vivant
James Nolan, poet, translator, writing coach, and highly entertaining noir fiction writer, has now turned his hand to the art of the memoir with his new book, Flight Risk.
11:30 a. m. — Queen Anne Parlor
Intermission
Authors will sign in the Book Mart
LITERATURE & LUNCH
11:45 — Cash Bar Opens, Bonnet Carre Room (Adjacent to Queen Anne Parlor)
Noon — Lunch is Served
Black Creole: Too White to Be Black, Too Black to Be White This is the title of the important new memoir and history of a culture by Maurice M. Martinez, a devoted author, poet, musician, and educator. Dr. Martinez will be interviewed by Megan Holt, Ph.d., Executive Director of One Book One New Orleans.
NOTE: Reservations must be made and paid for in advance of all Literature & Lunch sessions,
NEW ORLEANS, MON AMOUR: FILM
1:45 p. m. — Bonnet Carre Room
The New Orleans Creole: Too White to be Black, Too Black to be White In this documentary described as a “beautiful valentine to the Creole culture of New Orleans,” the photography, the music and, especially, the gloriously “Mix-Mastered” people Maurice Martinez interviews combine to create a poignant portrait of a place and a people before the overwhelming, life-altering disaster named Katrina. Film Event included in Literature & Lunch and Package Registrations. $5 per person all others.
BOOK MART REOPENS
3:00p. m. — Hotel Monteleone
WORKSHOP
3:00 p. m. — Hotel Monteone, Bonnet Carre Room
The All Important Query Letter & Everything Else you Need to Know Before, During, and After the Acquisition of Your Book. Editor, writing coach, and author Johnnie Bernhard and literary marketing expert Shari Stauch will conduct a workshop and query critiques.
Concurrent Programming
WORDS & MUSIC WRITERS ALLIANCE
HOSTED BY THE PEAUXDUNQUE CHAPTER OF THE ALLIANCE
3:00 p. m. — Hotel Monteleone, Orleans Room The Annual Meeting of the Words & Music Writers Alliance Readings on the 2017 Theme: War & Collateral Damage as Inspiration for the Arts Authors with new work are invited to read at this event. Author and attorney Tad Bartlett, whose law firm is among sponsors of Words & Music, will chair the event. He will begin with a remembrance of Terri Sue Shrum, a founding member of the alliance and winner of the Faulkner Society’s Gold Medal for Best Short Story.
4:30 p.m. to 6:30 p. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
WELCOME PARTY
High Tea & Cocktails: An Afternoon with Leonardo da Vinci
Two New Orleans natives will enlighten and entertain you with their experiences in researching and writing about the great Renaissance master. Karen Essex—bestselling author of the novel Leonardo’s Swans, a beautifully researched and delightfully entertaining tale about the women who vied and connived to have Leonardo da Vinci paint their portraits—will introduce and interview acclaimed journalist, think-tank leader and bestselling non-fiction biographer Walter Isaacson, author of, Leonardo da Vinci, another hit in Walter’s long list of hit biographies about such luminaries as Ben Franklin, Albert Einstein, and Steve Jobs.
ON THE TOWN A free evening for Words & Music to enjoy the sights and sounds and culinary delights of the Big Easy.
Friday, December 8, 2017
WAR & COLLATERAL DAMAGE
AS INSPIRATION FOR THE ARTS
8:00 a. m. — Hotel Monteleone, East Mezzanine
REGISTRATION DESK OPENS
8:00 a. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
CAFÉ AU LAIT AND CROISSANTS
Continental breakfast is served for registered guests.
8:00: a. m. —Queen Anne Parlor, Adjacent to Ballroom
WORDS & MUSIC BOOK MART REOPENS
8:00 a. m. —Queen Anne Ballroom
ANNOUNCEMENTS Remarks about the format of the day and announcements by Rosemary James,
Co-Founder, Pirate’s Alley Faulkner Society and Words & Music. There will be an opportunity for questions about the festival.
8:00 a. m. — Bonnet Carre Room
MANUSCRIPT CRITIQUE CONSULTATIONS
Writers with appointments with editors and agents will meet them in the Orleans Room, unless their assigned agents and editors have directed them to meet elsewhere.
Concurrent Programming
8:00 a. m — Orleans Room
REACHING THE PUBLIC WITH YOUR LITERARY NEWS
Getting Your Name Out There and, More Important, Making Your Book’s Title A Household Word. Learn How to Blog and Capitalize on Social Media. This session will feature one of America’s most successful bloggers, Barbara Barnett, well known arts blogger and executive editor of blogcritics magazine, who will be appearing with Bren McClain, a career communications consultant who has major corporations as well writers as clients. Both women also are fiction writers currently enjoying successful launches of their own debut novels: The Apothecary’s Curse and One Good Mamma Bone, respectively. They will be introduced by literary marketing specialist Shari Stauch.
9:00 a.m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
WAR & COLLATERAL DAMAGE AS INSPIRATION FOR THE ARTS
John Biguenet—widely published poet, translator, fiction writer, playwright, essayist, and media commentator—is truly a renaissance man of letters and regularly grapples with the Big Ideas in his own work. John will set the scene for our humanities theme discussions with his own thoughts on the theme and then lead the Q. & A. after each session.
9:15 a. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
Why Does the Civil War Continue to Haunt Americans
This session features two of the finest historians in America, Nancy Isenberg, Ph.D, author of White Trash, a bestselling exploration of class in America that posits that prejudice in this country has more to do with money and social standing than race, and Andrew Burstein, Ph.D, a premier scholar on Thomas Jefferson. His latest book is Democracy’s Muse: How Thomas Jefferson Became an FDR Liberal, a Reagan Republican, and a Teaparty Fanatic, All the While Being Dead.
10:30 a. m. Intermission
10:45 a. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
The Strange, Isolated Culture of North Korea; How It Inspired a Pulitzer Prize Novel; and How North Korea Continues to Make the World Nervous with its Warmongering.
The session will feature Adam Johnson, who won the Pulitzer Prize for his engrossing and enlightening novel, The Orphan Master’s Son, required reading for any serious reader seeking to understand North Korea. important especially in this time of a potential conflagration, as two bully boys try to out-insult one another. Adam will discuss his novel, North Korea, and how he became fascinated with the country and he will read passages from his novel.
11:30 a. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
A Child in the Era of the First Televised War, Today One off America’s Most Admired Authors, Will Discuss Vietnam’s Impact on Him and His Fiction.
Stewart O’Nan, who won the Faulkner Society’s very first Gold Medal for Best Novel in 1993, has since published 20 books of long fiction, short fiction, and non-fiction, including his Vietnam book, The Names of the Dead.
12:15 — Queen Anne Parlor
Intermission – Morning Presenters will sign in the Book Mart
LITERATURE & LUNCH
12:45 p. m. — Arnaud’s, 813 Bienville St. (Two blocks from Hotel Monteleone, Cash Bar opens.
1:15 p.m. — Lunch Served
1:30 p. m. — Program Vietnam, A 20th Century Cross To Bear; Vietnamese Refugees, God’s Gift To Louisiana Robert Olen Butler is proof positive of the way in which war has of turning on itself and giving us surprises to treasure. Butler, who served in Vietnam, won the Pulitzer Prize for A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain. More recently, he has revisited the transforming event of his life in his new novel Perfume River. The event will begin with his reading from A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain and end with his reading from Perfume River.
2:15 p.m.
Intermission
2:45 p. m. — Queen Ann Ballroom
WORKSHOP
A WRITERS ROUNDTABLE: Fiction in Conversation with Non-Fiction
What do Serious Writers Talk about When They are on the Town in New Orleans? What else, Writing!
Adam Johnsonwill lead a round table discussion with some of his famous writing pals, all Stanford University Wallace Stegner Fellows, all important prize winners and critically acclaimed literary celebrities. Johnson won the Pulitzer Prize for his incredibly insightful novel about North Korea, The Orphan Master’s Son, and the National Book Award for his collection Fortune Smiles. Joining him will be Gilbert King, who won the Pulitzer Prize for non-fiction for Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys and the Dawn of a New America; Louisiana native Skip Horack, author of the highly acclaimed novel The Other Joseph, The Eden Hunter, a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice, and a story collection, The Southern Cross, winner of the Bread Loaf Bakeless Fiction Prize, the winner of two major Hopwood awards and the Andrea Beauchamp Prize for short fiction; Scott Hutchins, whose novel A Working Theory of Love was a San Francisco Chronicle and Salon Best Book of 2012 and has been translated into nine languages; Eric Puchner author of the collection Music Through the Floor, finalist for the California Book Award and the NYPL Young Lions of Fiction Award, and of the novel Model Home, finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Prize; Stephen Elliott ,who directed the movie About Cherry, is founder of The Rumpus, and author of seven books including The Adderall Diaries; and Eric Schwartzchild, author of the novels Responsible Men and The Family Diamond.
4:00 p. m. — Queen Ann Parlor
Intermission
Luncheon & Round Table Authors will sign in the Book Mart
4:30 p. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
MASTER CLASS: 2017 AGENTS & EDITORS MEETING
How to Get an Agent, the Right Agent, and Working with an Editor Literary Agent Jeff Kleinman, partner in Folio Literary Management, will lead this session with his special brand of hi-jinx to get the Editors and Agents pumped up and ready to enjoy Words & Music 2017, while concurrently giving registered writers the low down on selling their books and getting them into print. Joining Jeff will be all of 2017’s participating agents and editors. Agents in addition to Jeff are Malaga Baldi, Lisa Bankston, Elise Capron, Katherine Fausset, Deborah Grosvenor, Christine Pride, Katharine Sands, Michelle Tessler, and Jennifer Weltz. Editors include Johnnie Bernhard, Libby Burton, Sarah Cortez, Sylvain Creekmore, Kim Davis, Jasmine Faustino, Allison Lorentzen, and Anne Speyer.
5:30 p. m. Intermission
5:45 p. m. — Orleans Room
WORKSHOP:
GET THE READER IN THE FIRST FEW PAGES
How do I find the right opening for my work of fiction or creative non-fiction?
Christine Pride of Simon & Schuster will conduct this workshop, Invited to join her is legendary literary agent Deborah Grosvenor, who discovered the repeat bestseller, Tom Clancy.
OPERA, BURLESQUE…AND ALL THAT JAZZ
7:15 p. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom, Bar Opens, Hors d’oevres.
7:30 p. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom So you like your sauces hot? Well, we have a sneak preview for a brand new burlesque opera, Tabasco, inspired by Louisiana’s famous hot sauce, second only to music in popularity of Louisiana exports. Maestro Paul Mauffray of the New Orleans Opera will introduce a few of the spicy numbers from the opera by members of the cast.
So You Want to be a Burlesque Star! Bella Blue, the heralded Queen of Burlesque in New Orleans , will Tell You How it’s Done and then Show You! The art of burlesque—not to be confused with lap dancing in unsavory saloons—has a long, long history in New Orleans and, largely thanks to Bella Blue, the art is enjoying a big revival in New Orleans. Bella has consented to give us a bit of the history of the art and then perform for us, showing us all the right moves.
The Mid City Miracle,featuring Robert Eustis and Alex Bosworth, will accompany Bella and then play for us.
9:30 p. m. — On the Town
YOU’RE ON YOUR OWN! May we suggest that you will want to try the best bars in New Orleans during your stay, including the Monteleone Hotel’s world famous Carousel Bar and the Napoleon House.
Saturday, December 9
8:00 a. m. — Hotel Monteleone, East Mezzanine
REGISTRATION DESK OPENS Registered guests may pick up their passes and/or tickets and a program. Others may register at this time or purchase tickets for events of the festival.
8:00 a. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom CAFÉ AU LAIT AND CROISSANTS
Continental breakfast is served for registered guests.
8:00 a. m. — Bonnet Carre Room
MANUSCRIPT CRITIQUE CONSULTATIONS BEGIN
8:30: a. m. —Queen Anne Parlor, Adjacent to Ballroom
WORDS & MUSIC BOOK MART REOPENS
8:30 a. m. —Queen Anne Ballroom
ANNOUNCEMENTS
8:45 a.m. — Bonnet Carre Room
WORKSHOP: ROBERT OLEN BUTLER
What Kind of Fiction do you want to write…and think you actually are writing?
This 90-minute event will address delineations between literary fiction and mainstream fiction, the essential elements of each, how to successfully achieve these elements, and why a writer might want to select one type of fiction rather than another to pursue. Lisa Bankoff will introduce Pulitzer Prize winning fiction writer Robert Olen Butler, is arguably the best fiction teacher in the country, who will teach the workshop.
10:30 a. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
MASTER CLASS: CHARACTER DRIVEN FICTION
Whether Long or Short, the Characters and the Universe They Occupy Are the Keys to Successful Fiction Tim Gautreaux, whose latest book in a great portfolio of novels and stories, is Signals: New and Selected Stories, released earlier this year, and Ladee Hubbard, a prize-winning short story writer whose debut novel, The Talented Ribkins, just released, is making waves in the literary world. What their books have in common is their talent for writing imaginative tales about ordinary people. Tim and Ladee will join Literary Agents Michelle Tessler and Jeff Kleinman in this session on the creation of believable, memorable characters who draw you into their stories.
11:30 a. m. —Queen Anne Parlor
Intermission
Tim Gautreaux and Ladee Hubbard will sign in the Book Mart
WAR & COLLATERAL DAMAGE AS INSPIRATION FOR THE ARTS
11:45 p. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
Global Citizenship to Combat War and Inspire the Arts
Kathryn Ramsperger will discuss her character-driven novel, The Shores of our Souls, a love story inspired by her humanitarian work in war torn, poverty stricken areas abroad.
Noon—Queen Anne Ballroom
Finding Literary Inspiration in the Global War on Poverty
Jesica Jackley is the author of Clay Water Brick: Finding Inspiration from Entrepreneurs Who Do the Most with the Least.
12:30 p. m —Queen Anne Parlor
Intermission
Ms. Ramsperger and Ms. Jackley will sign in the Book Mart
LITERATURE & LUNCH
12:45 p. m. — Riverview Room, Roof, Hotel Monteleone Hotel Cash Bar opens
1:00 p. m. Lunch is served.
Taking God’s Name in Vain to Wage War
Reza Aslan is the noted religious scholar, television commentator on the Middle East, and bestselling non-fiction author of such notable books as No God But God, How to Win a Cosmic War, and Zealot: The Life & Times of Jesus of Nazareth, all runaway bestsellers in America and internationally. His new book, just out is God: a Human History. Whether you believe in one God, many gods, or no god at all, God: A Human History will challenge the way you think about the divine and its role in our everyday lives.
2:30 p. m — Queen Anne Parlor Intermission Reza Aslan will sign in the Book Mart
2:45 p. m. _ Orleans Room
MANUSCRIPT CRITIQUES CONTINUE
Concurrent Programming
2:45 p. m. — Orleans Room
PUBLISHING
The Role of the University Press in Contemporary Publishing Increasingly, university presses are becoming an important avenue for authors seeking publication. We are delighted to have Texas Review Press represented at Words & Music this year. The session will be introduced by editor and author Johnnie Bernhard. Featured will be Kim Davis, managing director of the press; Sarah Cortez, poet and poetry editor for the press; and Jack Bedell, who has just been selected Poet Laureate of Louisiana
3:30 p. m. Intermission
3:45 p. m. —Orleans Room
THE MUSE ON THE MISSISSIPPI
New work by poets participating in Words & Music will be performed.
Participating poets will include Carolyn Hembree, who judged the Faulkner Society’s 2017 poetry competition and her winner, Stacey Balkun, and runner-up, Chad Foret; Louisiana’s new Poet Laureate, Jack Bedell; Poet and Texas Review Press Poetry Editor Sarah Cortez; literary editor Libby Burton of Henry Holt and author of the new book of poetry, Soft Volcano, due out in March; William Lavender, critically acclaimed poet and founder of the boutique press Lavender Ink; New Orleans author Benjamin Morris, whose newly released book is Ecotone.
5:15 p. m.
Intermission
Authors will sign in the Book Mart, Queen Anne Parlor
PAN AMERICAN CONNECTIONS
Tropicalia: How a Dirty War by a Brutal Dictatorship in Brazil Against its Own People Inspired a Counter Cultural Revolution that Produced some of the Best Literature and Music of the 20th Century.
The sesssion will be introduced by Daniel Castro, one of the Faulkner Society’s literary discoveries, who won two gold medals in the Society’s competion, one for novella and one for novel. The session will star Christopher Dunn, Ph.D, an expert in the language and culture of Brazil, and members of the Brazilian band Fruta Brutal, led by Martin Better, musician and singer, and also featuring Amy Medvick, a Canadian performer, songwriter, and scholar of Brazilian popular music,
The group will play illustrative pieces during the session and continue playing for the cocktail hour of Faulkner for All!
6:30 p. m.
Intermission
7:00 p. m. — Royal Suites, Ground Floor, Hotel Monteleone
FAULKNER FOR ALL
The black-tie annual meeting of the Pirate’s Alley Faulkner Society. Cocktails & Presentation of 2017 Gold Medal winners of the William Faulkner – William Wisdom Creative Writing Competition. Competition judges Katherine Fausset, Walter Isaacson, Stewart O’Nan, Tim Gautreaux, Christine Pride, Franz Wisner, Carolyn Hembree, and George Bishop, will present their winners; Pulitzer prize winner Robert Olen Butler will present the 2017 ALIHOT (A Legend in His/Her Own Time) Award winners.
8:30 p.m. —Queen Anne Ballroom Dinner, Entertainment, Music, Dancing
Humorist Roy Blount, Jr., whose wit is legendary, will be toastmaster for the event. Other entertainment for this event will be a tribute to the late, great New Orleans Rock and Roll star, Antoine “Fats” Domino, who passed away recently. Professor Craig Adams, who teaches music at the New Orleans Maritime University, has his own band, and will do 15 -minute tribute to “Fats” at the beginning of the program and the play at the end for dancing.
The highlight of the evening will be a performance by the celebrated film and television actor Gerald McRaney, who will perform a piece from his starring role in the new film adaptation of William Faulkner’s first novel, Soldiers’ Pay, written while he was living on Pirate’s Alley in 1925. Film producers Michie Gleason and film colleagues Blue André and Edward Wilson, will be accompanying him to the event.
Sunday, December 10
8:00 a. m. — Hotel Monteleone, East Mezzanine
REGISTRATION DESK OPENS
8:00 a. m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
CAFÉ AU LAIT AND CROISSANTS Continental breakfast is served for registered guests.
8:30 a. m. — Orleans Room
FINAL MANUSCRIPT CRITIQUE CONSULTATION SESSIONS
8:30: a. m. —Queen Anne Parlor, Adjacent to Ballroom
WORDS & MUSIC BOOK MART REOPENS
8:30 a. m. —Queen Anne Ballroom
ANNOUNCEMENTS
8:45 a.m. — Queen Anne Ballroom
MASTER CLASS The Art of the Memoir Franz Wisner, author of the bestselling memoir Honeymoon With My Brother; Rosemary Daniell, non-fiction author of essays and memoirs, such as the classic Sleeping with Soldiers, and creator of the Zona Rosa writing program; and Alex Sheshunoff, author of Beginner’s Guide to Paradise, will discuss the elements necessary to create an enjoyable, publishable memoir, giving away their own tricks of the trade, including how to find a concept which elevates the routine to the memorable. All three are working on new books of their own right now. They will introduced by literary agent Katharine Sands, who represents both non-fiction and fiction clients.
9:45 a. m. — Queen Anne Parlor
Intermission Authors will sign in the book mart.
LITERATURE BY WRITERS BORN IN THE SOUTH
This series will be introduced by Faulkner Society Co-founder Rosemary James
10 a. m. —Queen Anne Ballroom
There’s the Romantic side of it.
Joyce Blaylock, author of Adelicia, a fictional saga based on one woman’s determination to survive the Civil War with her inheritance intact, will discuss the historic southern fascination with literature filled with romantic characters, heroic deeds, and chivalry. She will be joined by literary editor Sylvan Creekmore.
10:30 a. m.
And then there’s the dark side of it: Southern Gothic
Literary agent Jeff Kleinman, who will lead this panel, has an afffinity for it, and so does J.C. Sasser, whose debut novel, Gradle Bird, revolves around a mentally defective man ostracized by the community of a backwoods Georgia town.
11:00 a. m.
The Aesthetics of Literature: Getting the Geography Right
William Faulkner was so obsessed with the importance of setting the scene properly for his readers, that he created an entire county, Yoknatawpha, out of his imagination, loosely related to his own home county in Mississippi but still a place of the imagination. Faulkner went so far as to draw maps of the settings for his stories and novels. Featured speakers will be Tim Gautreaux, whose new book is Signals: New and Collected Stories, and Brenda McClain, whose novel, One Good Mother Bone, was published last year.
11:30 a. m.
Intermission
Authors will sign in the Book Mart
Noon — Queen Anne Ballroom
HOW TO READ FAULKNER AND LOVE IT!
This year’s examination of Faulkner’s work will zero in on how war and its collateral damage inspired some of Faulkner’s master works. The event will be introduced by
non-fiction author Roy Blount, Jr., who is expert in all things southern, and will feature W. Kenneth Holditch, Faulkner scholar and co-founder of the Faulkner Society and Tennessee Williams Festival, who taught Southern literature for many years at the University of New Orleans.
The focus book this year is Flags in the Dust, a book important to readers delving into Faulkner for the first time as it sets up families and characters who will appear in much of Faulkner’s work. Flags in the Dust deals with the impact of war on a family.
The session will conclude with a performance reading from Flags in the Dust by a group of New Orleans actors led by Michael Arata.
2:30 p.m – 4:30 p. m.
Faulkner House, 624 Pirate’s Alley
FAREWELL PARTY
Dessert and Champagne with Mr. Faulkner’s ghost!