In 1989, Tom Clancy ruled the best-seller list, Anne Tyler's Breathing Lessons won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, and Salman Rushdie's The Satanic Verses made a household word of fatwa. Kindle? Hell, that was something you did with a pile of sticks, so you could curl up by the fireplace with the latest Calvin & Hobbes.
A lot of handwringing over the state of print culture has transpired since then, but one very visible success story stands in sharp counterpoint. Celebrating its 25th anniversary this year, the Southern Festival of Books has grown from a regional celebration of the written word into a fall destination for hundreds of touring authors — and tens of thousands of avid readers. When the booksellers' tents go up on War Memorial Plaza Oct. 11-13, the spectacle downtown will make all those chronicles of literature's death foretold look mighty premature.
If 2012's festival featured a stunning assemblage of literary debuts — from Ben Fountain's Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk to Karen Thompson Walker's The Age of Miracles — this year's lineup has name recognition in spades, from memoirist/essayist Bill Bryson to Fight Club ref Chuck Palahniuk, from former Vice President Al Gore to former Newsweek editor Jon Meacham, from Far From the Tree author Andrew Solomon to Banshee creator Jonathan Tropper. Among the first-time authors, perhaps none has had a better year than Ayana Mathis, whose The Twelve Tribes of Hattie received both critical acclaim and a huge audience as the flagship book that launched Oprah's Book Club 2.0.
Of special note is a reunion of seven esteemed authors from the very first Southern Festival: Roy Blount Jr., Allan Gurganus, Bobbie Ann Mason, Jill McCorkle, Cathie Pelletier, Lee Smith and Alana White. Still to come is the roster for the popular Authors in the Round dinner, which last year had lucky patrons breaking bread with Gone Girl author Gillian Flynn, among others. Peruse the whole list at humanitiestennessee.org — and thank SFB sponsor Humanities Tennessee for putting a sock in those death knells for books and reading. Oct. 11-13 at War Memorial Plaza
Don't Miss:
Sept. 12: Marisha Pessl at Salon@615
For her second novel, Night Film, Marisha Pessl created a fictional film director so convincing that Rob Brunner, writing in The New York Times Magazine, admitted he was a fan. "The inconvenient fact that Cordova is entirely fictional has not prevented me from getting strangely hooked on his work," Brunner wrote. Now that's suspension of disbelief. 6:15 p.m. at the downtown public library; see the review here
Sept. 12: Deborah Eisenberg at Vanderbilt
The New York Times' Michiko Kakutani remarked that Eisenberg's stories, which have appeared everywhere from The New Yorker to Tin House, capture the "fresh, mixed-up, happy-sad texture of real life." To wit, Eisenberg's 2010 Collected Stories captured the PEN/Faulkner Award, not long after she herself was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship. 7 p.m. at Buttrick 101
Sept. 26: Kevin Young at Vanderbilt
Not many writers have the chops to hit back-to-back home runs, much less in different genres. But Kevin Young followed his American Book Award-winning poetry collection Ardency: A Chronicle of the Amistad Rebels with The Grey Album: On the Blackness of Blackness, a nonfiction work that landed as a finalist for the 2013 National Book Critics Circle Award and on the shortlist for the 2013 PEN Open Award. 7 p.m. at Wilson 126
Oct. 3: Steve Stern at Vanderbilt
Memphis native Stern's first book, Isaac and the Undertaker's Daughter, drew from his study of The Pinch, the city's old Jewish ghetto. 7 p.m. at Buttrick 101
Oct. 24: Lynn Emanuel at Vanderbilt
At her best, Lynn Emanuel imbues the commonplace with a bracing, Plathian menace, as in the opening line from the poem "Single Girl. One Room Flat.": "Even the butter's a block of sleazy light." Her forthcoming collection Noose and Hook will join Hotel Fiesta, The Dig and Then, Suddenly on discerning bookshelves. 7 p.m. at Buttrick Hall 101
Oct. 29: Pat Conroy at Salon@615
Pat Conroy will discuss his latest, The Death of Santini, a memoir about his father. Conroy has written nine books, including The Great Santini and The Prince of Tides. 6:15 p.m. at downtown public library
Nov. 4: Ann Patchett at Salon@615
Internationally beloved novelist, local scene-making entrepreneur — Ann Patchett is more than a Nashville treasure. Another notch in her belt: She is also author of a book unironically titled This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage. 6:15 p.m. at downtown public library
Nov. 18: Amy Tan at Salon@615
Tan rocketed to fame with a little joy and luck; her latest work tracks a mysterious painting called The Valley of Amazement, which gives the novel its title, as well as the interconnected lives of three generations of women. 6:15 p.m. at downtown public library
Nov. 20: Nikki Giovanni at Salon@615
A poet and activist of Giovanni's stature (she holds the Langston Hughes Medal for Outstanding Poetry, among many other honors) really needs no introduction. That she'll have a new collection to read from — that'd be Chasing Utopia, her first since 2010 — makes the occasion that much more special. 6:15 p.m. at downtown public library
Also of note:
Oct. 22: Donna Tartt (The Goldfinch) at Salon@615
Oct. 28: Garrison Keillor (O What a Luxury) at Salon@615
Nov. 5: Wally Lamb (We Are Water) at Salon@615
Nov. 7: Justin Torres (We the Animals) at Vanderbilt
Nov. 9: Literary Award Gala honoring Robert K. Massie at downtown public library
Nov. 11: Elizabeth Gilbert (The Signature of All Things) at Salon@615
Dec. 19: Poet's Corner featuring Rick Hilles at Scarritt-Bennett
Email editor@nashvillescene.com.
