Literary Discussion

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A TRUMAN CAPOTE READING AND DISCUSSION
A TRUMAN CAPOTE READING AND DISCUSSION

Celebrating the 100th year of Southern writer Truman Capote’s birth with readings, discussion, and stories are moderator and Capote scholar, Stuart Noel, Ph.D., who founded and chairs the Truman Capote Literary Society; Brenda Currin, who portrayed Nancy Clutter in Capote’s In Cold Blood; Anna Christina Radziwill, daughter of the late Prince Stanislas Radziwill of Poland and Lee Bouvier Radziwill, sister of Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis. Tina’s mother and Truman Capote were close friends for many years; and Gary Richards, Southern literature scholar.

 

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CREATING THE WRITER’S CITY
CREATING THE WRITER’S CITY

In a discussion sparked by T.R. Johnson’s New Orleans: The Writer’s City, scholar T.R. Johnson shares his particular vision of a complicated literary landscape. Novelist Maurice Carlos Ruffin has envisioned a New Orleans of the future in his first book, a contemporary city in his second, and in his third, The American Daughters, he paints an unforgettable portrait of the antebellum world here. Moira Crone’s vision of the drowned city in The Not-Yet is so persuasive that architecture students have been inspired to create models of it. And poet Skye Jackson, who studied at UNO, is a leading light of the new generation of writers. Novelist George Bishop moderates.

 

 

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DEFINING CHARACTER: THREE UNORTHODOX BIOGRAPHIES
DEFINING CHARACTER: THREE UNORTHODOX BIOGRAPHIES

How does a biographer present the facts of a life and also capture the atmosphere, the impact on culture, and perhaps even some of the magic left behind by their subject? Three writers present a trio of expertly researched life stories that transcend typical biography. In Radiant: The Life and Line of Keith Haring, author Brad Gooch chronicles the emblematic artist of 80s-era New York whose renegade art inspired radical social change. Cynthia Carr profiles Warhol superstar and transgender icon Candy Darling in a new groundbreaking biography. Nancy Schoenberger gives one of Tennessee Williams’ most complex creations, Blanche DuBois from A Streetcar Named Desire, a thorough psychological examination in a multifaceted study of the fictional figure. Moderated by David Johnson.

 

 

 

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EXPLORING BLANCHE DUBOIS AND THE WOMEN OF TENNESSEE WILLIAMS
EXPLORING BLANCHE DUBOIS AND THE WOMEN OF TENNESSEE WILLIAMS

This panel will explore contemporary Williams and discuss interpretations of his most inspired creation, Blanche DuBois and his adjacent women. A panel of writers and performers will discuss the significance and complexities of his female characters and the female gaze on Williams’ work. The panel will be moderated by Jaclyn Bethany, writer, director, actor and rising Williams scholar, and will include panelists Beth Bartley d’Amour, who has played Blanche as well as numerous Williams women; Lin Gathright, actress and co-artistic director (with Bethany) of New Orleans’ new female focused theater company, The Fire Weeds; LaKesha Glover, actor, producer, and creator of the production company, Tootsie’s Production; Nancy Shoenberger, author of Blanche: The Life and Times of Tennessee Williams’s Greatest Creation; and Judy Lea Steele, interdisciplinary actress, playwright, poet and performance artist.

 

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FILM:  LITERARY NEW ORLEANS
FILM: LITERARY NEW ORLEANS

The city of New Orleans has served as a setting for many of the world’s most famous literary works, including A Streetcar Named Desire, Interview with the Vampire and A Confederacy of Dunces. This documentary  takes an up-close look at the locally written word over a more than three-century history. Included are interviews with Anne Rice, Tennessee Williams and Thelma Toole, the mother of John Kennedy Toole. Among the authors and literary experts interviewed are Edwin Blair, Douglas Brinkley, Nancy Dixon, Rien Fertel, Dr. Kenneth Holditch, Walter Isaacson, Susan Larson, T. R. Johnson, Maurice Carlos Ruffin, Dr. Mona Lisa Saloy and Kalamu Ya Salaam. Produced and narrated by Peggy Scott Laborde, who will be on hand for a brief discussion following the showing of the program.

 

 

 

 

 

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FROM THE WRITING ROOM TO THE THEATER: ADAPTING BOOK TO SCREEN
FROM THE WRITING ROOM TO THE THEATER: ADAPTING BOOK TO SCREEN

What’s it like to see your book make it to the screen as a film or television series? How do writers navigate the world of film? Our panelists include Sascha Rothschild, author of Blood Sugar and an Emmy-nominated screenwriter who has worked on GLOW, The Bold Type, The BabySitters Club, and The Carrie Diaries. She also adapted her article “How to Get Divorced by 30,” into a screenplay for Universal Studios. You can see Sidney Thompson’s Bass Reeves Trilogy of western novels as a series now airing on Paramount. Justin Torres’ award-winning debut novel, We the Animals, became a feature-length film. M.O. Walsh’s charming The Big Door Prize, became a mini-series for Apple TV, heading into its second season this April. Clint Bowie of the New Orleans Film Society moderates the discussion.

 

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GREAT STORIES FROM NEW ORLEANS INSTITUTIONS
GREAT STORIES FROM NEW ORLEANS INSTITUTIONS

Every city with a long history has stewards who care for its treasures, whether they be institutions or ideas. In The Building of the National World War II Museum, founder and president Gordon “Nick” Mueller describes the inception and growth of what has become the city’s leading museum. Robert Becker, in New Orleans City Park: From Tragedy to Triumph, chronicles his 20-year tenure as CEO of City Park and the hard work of staff and volunteers to bring the park through Katrina and COVID and insure its financial security. Journalist and historian Errol Laborde celebrates unique New Orleans moments in New Orleans cultural history in When Rex Met Zulu. Documentarian Peggy Scott Laborde, whose most recent work is Literary New Orleans, moderates.

 

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HISTORY IS MY MUSE: FINDING PRESENT INSPIRATION IN THE PAST
HISTORY IS MY MUSE: FINDING PRESENT INSPIRATION IN THE PAST

History is a gold mine for the discerning writer, prospecting for nuggets from the distant—or recent—past in archives and the historical record. Fordham University professor Edward Cahill takes us back to the pre-Stonewall era in Disorderly Men, a story of a police raid on a gay bar and its complicated consequences. Julia Malye tells a tale of resourceful women, “volunteers” shipped from France to the Louisiana Territory, in Pelican Girls. Louisiana State University professor and author Maurice Carlos Ruffin imagines what his female ancestors would have done to resist the Confederacy in the antebellum era in The American Daughters. Wendy Chin-Tanner draws on her father’s experience as a patient in what was then known as the leprosarium in Carville, Louisiana, for her first novel, King of the Armadillos. And Colm Toíbín has crafted many novels—Brooklyn and the forthcoming Long Island among them—from the rich history of Ireland and New York. Miles Harvey, author of The King of Confidence moderates.

 

 

 

 

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LEGENDS OF BURLESQUE
LEGENDS OF BURLESQUE

Over the last century, vaudeville’s naughtier cousin, burlesque, has become a truly American art form, full of irreverence and dynamism. Though considered a sultry and bawdy form of entertainment, by the 1950s it was practically mainstream, especially in New Orleans with its main entertainment strip lined with nightclubs featuring both national and local dancers. Through memoirs and interviews, Historic New Orleans Collection curator Nina Bozak remembers some of these dancers in their own words from memoirs and interviews and through images of their signature acts. Hear about Blaze Starr’s first time on stage as a stripper, the lesson Kalantan learned from Lili St. Cyr, and the connection between Rita Alexander and New Orleans legendary drummer Smokey Johnson. See a photographic series of Stormy Lawrence’s signature number and watch Sally Rand’s famous Bubble Dance. And be titillated by a special performance by one of New Orleans’s current burlesque legends, Bella Blue!
This event is sponsored by The Ethel and Herman L. Midlo Center for New Orleans Studies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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MAKING AN ENTRANCE: NEW FICTION VOICES WITH STYLE
MAKING AN ENTRANCE: NEW FICTION VOICES WITH STYLE

Readers love finding a new writer who has a fresh and exciting style or captivating point of view, and we’re excited to welcome these new voices in fiction. Novelist and poet Chin-Sun Lee’s first book, Upcountry, about a couple who moves from New York City to a small country town, with all the social change that that implies, was listed among Publishers Weekly‘s Big Indie Books of Fall 2023. Annell Lopez‘s debut short story collection, I’ll Give You a Reason, about the lives of immigrants in New Jersey, is the winner of the Louise Meriwether First Book Prize from the Feminist Press Award, and will appear in April. Jess Armstrong is the author of The Curse of Penryth Hall, the winner of the Mystery Writers of America/ Minotaur First Crime Novel Competition. Julia Malye takes readers back to the French colonial Gulf Coast in The Pelican Girls, a novel about strong women based in historical reality. Nick Medina, a member of the Tunica-Biloxi Tribe of Louisiana, weaves tribal myths into the contemporary world of crime and casinos in Sisters of the Lost Nation and Indian Burial Ground. Moderated by New Orleans writer, C. Morgan Babst, author of The Floating World.

 

 

 

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NEW VISTAS, GRAND OUTLOOKS: RENDERING THE LANDSCAPE IN POETRY
NEW VISTAS, GRAND OUTLOOKS: RENDERING THE LANDSCAPE IN POETRY

This panel will feature poets Carolyn Hembree, Rodney Jones, Christine Kwon, Alison Pelegrin and Gina Ferrara (moderator) discussing ways that landscapes inform their work and sharing poems from their latest collections.

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OTHERWORLDLY FICTION
OTHERWORLDLY FICTION

The skill of world building is essential to fine fiction, inviting the reader to enter the author’s fully created world. Ariadne Blayde enters into the world of French Quarter ghost tours to give us a New Orleans we’ve only glimpsed before. Tara Lynn Masih takes us to the boundaries of nature and place, known for her skill in flash fiction, and Nick Medina explores the intersection of indigenous crime fiction/horror and the tensions between the life of reservation community and the burgeoning casino culture. David Slayton writes the sorts of books he always hoped to read, fantasies of warlocks and druids. All of these writers are skilled in the uses of imagination and atmosphere. Moderated by author Adrian Van Young.

 

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PARABLES OF A WORLD CORRUPTED—POLITICS IN THE PLAYS OF TENNESSEE WILLIAMS
PARABLES OF A WORLD CORRUPTED—POLITICS IN THE PLAYS OF TENNESSEE WILLIAMS

In a 1967 interview, when Tennessee Williams was asked if he ever wrote directly about the struggle for civil rights or about the American war in Viet Nam, he replied, “I am not a direct writer, I am always an oblique writer, if I can be; I want to be allusive, I don’t want to be one of those people who hits the nail on the head all the time.” The playwright’s answer reinforced a longstanding idea that Williams was not a political writer when, in fact, politics are woven into the fabric of everything he wrote—often quite directly! This panel will examine some of Williams’ politics both onstage and off, looking at the most overt examples of politics in plays such as Camino Real, Sweet Bird of Youth, Orpheus Descending, and The Red Devil Battery Sign, as well as the powerful ways in which politics surround and support narratives in his other plays. At times the indirect approach can be an even more potent way to reach an audience and is found in plays as divergent as The Glass Menagerie, Stairs to the Roof, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and Green Eyes. The panelists will include Thomas Keith, Tom Mitchell, and Bess Rowen. Benjamin Gillespie will moderate. 

 

 

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TENNESSEE 101 WITH AUGUSTIN J CORRERO
TENNESSEE 101 WITH AUGUSTIN J CORRERO

Tennessee 101 is a fast-paced, fun, and informative introduction to Tennessee Williams! It’s focused on Williams’ unique relationship to New Orleans, as well as the various bits of trivia and lore relating to the theatre offerings at the Festival this year. Whether you’re new to the world of Williams or a long-time fan, come prepared to learn something. Presented by Augustin J Correro, Co-Artistic Director of The Tennessee Williams Theatre Company of New Orleans. There’s a Q&A session at the end, and be sure to get your copy of Tennessee Williams 101 for a brief signing to follow.

 

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THE OTHER SIDE OF DESIRE:  TENNESSEE WILLIAMS ON LIFE, LOVE, AND DEATH
THE OTHER SIDE OF DESIRE:  TENNESSEE WILLIAMS ON LIFE, LOVE, AND DEATH

When Blanche DuBois arrives in the French Quarter of New Orleans in the first scene of A Streetcar Named Desire, she tells Eunice, “They told me to take a streetcar named Desire, and then transfer to one called Cemeteries and ride six blocks and get off at—Elysian Fields!” So, from the very beginning of the play, we are reminded that death and desire have a symbiotic relationship. Whether dramas, comedies, full-length, or one-acts, death is present in all of Williams’ plays, both onstage and off, and so is life. For Williams, sexual desire is part of the life force, the urge to live, and so a counterbalance to the inevitability of death. This panel will explore the many ways Williams deals with death and life in his work. Scenes and characters that will be examined come from plays including A Streetcar Named Desire, The Rose Tattoo, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, The Milk Train Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore, Vieux Carré, A House Not Meant to Stand, Kingdom of Earth, I Can’t Imagine Tomorrow, The Mutilated, The Day on Which a Man Dies, and Something Cloudy, Something Clear, to name just a few. Panelists include Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist John Pope, Augustin J Correro, Margit Longbrake, and Annette Saddik, moderated by Thomas Keith.

 

 

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VOICES FROM THE PAST: HEARING OUR ANCESTORS IN THE PRESENT
VOICES FROM THE PAST: HEARING OUR ANCESTORS IN THE PRESENT

Whether as editors, translators, or anthologists, writers are often called to steward the works of their predecessors alongside creating their own work. Poet Benjamin Morris will moderate a panel exploring the challenges of shepherding books from the past into the present: fiction writer Kayla Min Andrews edited her late mother Katherine Min’s novel The Fetishist, now published posthumously. Poet and professor Ariel Francisco has a forthcoming translation of Haitian poet Jacques Viau Renaud, killed at age 23 in the Dominican Revolution. And Gina Ferrara has recently revived the New Orleans Poetry Journal Press, first founded by Maxine Cassin decades ago, with a new anthology of 100 contemporary New Orleans poets. Each of these writers will discuss how they brought these voices to modern ears, and what literary citizenship means for writer and reader today.

 

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WHY THE ART OF IMPROV ENDURES
WHY THE ART OF IMPROV ENDURES

Improv scholar Randy Fertel, author of A Taste for Chaos: The Art of Literary Improvisation and Winging It: Improv’s Power and Peril in the Time of Trump, talks with literary scholar T.R. Johnson, author of New Orleans: A Writer’s City, about the ongoing relevance of improvisation in the larger culture. Seen through Fertel’s discerning eye, improv is everywhere—from the  music of Louis Armstrong to the smash musical Hamilton, the rise of AI, and the off-the-cuff, unmediated remarks of Donald Trump, whom Fertel calls the Improviser-in-Chief. He uses neuroscience, bioevolution, and cultural texts to illuminate his subject. Johnson, who writes about the complex interactions between writers and place, adds his thoughts about improvisation in New Orleans literature.

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WRITERS OF A CERTAIN AGE
WRITERS OF A CERTAIN AGE

Being published is hardly a young person’s game, but that’s the perception the world has of writers. How many “under 30/40” lists are there? The implicit assumption is that those who haven’t already made it by the time they’ve hit 50 are never going to get published. This is, of course, absurd, as many brilliant, successful writers have proven! Working in the youth-obsessed world of publishing as writers born in or before the Ford administration, these panelists have experience proving the world wrong. Learn about the challenges, successes and strategies as writers of a certain age. Miles Harvey moderates this discussion with Jubi Arriola-Headley, Teresa Tumminello Brader, Chin-Sun Lee, and Rose Norman.

 

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WRITING SOUTHERN GOTHIC IN MODERN NEW ORLEANS 
WRITING SOUTHERN GOTHIC IN MODERN NEW ORLEANS 

Exploring themes such as religious intensity, moral disorder, ancestral homes in resplendent decay, systemic racism, endemic poverty, and the encroachment of the supernatural on everyday life, William Faulkner, Flannery O’Connor, Zora Neale Hurston, Tennessee Williams, and Carson McCullers pioneered this often romanticized and occasionally parodied genre into the American consciousness in the early 20th-century. Now, in the 21st, writers like Jesmyn Ward, Karen Russell, Silvia Moreno-Garcia and Toni Morrison have dynamically furthered those first explorations, in many instances reinventing them entirely. This mixed-genre panel of fiction writers, essayists, and poets will seek to unearth Southern Gothic then and now, posing such questions as: Where do we find ourselves on the so-called pantheon of early-to-mid 20th-century Southern Gothic writers? What does it mean to write Southern Gothic in the most Gothic city in America? At what point does Southern Gothic go from being an exploration of a society in decay to a fetishization of that same decay? How do we expand our definitions of Southern Gothic to take in the “Global South,” to include Latin American and Caribbean works of Southern Gothic, as well? How have the objects of social critique in Southern Gothic literature (racism, classism, evangelicalism, feudalism, criminality) shifted over time, illuminating new corners of a region in freefall? Come get a little creepy—but a little thoughtful, too—with panelists Anya Groner, Carolyn Hembree, Alex Jennings, and Adrian Van Young, moderated by Brad Richard. 

 

 

 

$10.00