Awp conference & Bookfair 2018 Tentative Accepted Events

Side-Hustle Publishing: Sustaining a Small Press in Austere Times (Steve Halle, Laura Cesarco Eglin, Adam Clay, Sarah Gzemski, Ellen Kombiyil)

How do small presses confront issues of sustainability in an era when available resources like funding, time, energy, and people power for literary publishing are spread thinner than ever? Representatives from The (Great) Indian Poetry Collective, co•im•press, Noemi Press, Shelterbelt Press, and Veliz Books focus on practical lessons they’ve learned along the way, including critical decisions and essential techniques for building a thriving, community-driven organization with limited means.

Silenced Dimensions in Crisis and Conflict (Catherine Parnell, Jasmin Darznik, Martha (Max) Frazier, Monica Sok, Danuta Ewa Hinc)

In narratives about international conflict, women writers, and those identifying as women, are marginalized and grossly underrepresented. Exposing their lack of visibility and peeling back the layers of privilege is the goal of Consequence Magazine’s Tenth Anniversary issue, and we’ve dedicated our Spring 2018 issue to women writers. In this panel, we’ll talk to four writers who write about the culture and consequences of war, and activism, and how they see writing as a path to peace.

Slam, Veer, Hush, & Hook: On Ending Poems (David Baker, Linda Gregerson, Stanley Plumly, Ann Townsend)

Prompts, assignments, workshops, those snappy first lines—we’re awfully good at beginning poems. Ending a poem well is much harder. Our panel of esteemed poet-critics looks at varieties of closure and non-closure in poems ranging across cultures, historical periods, and styles—and including their own work. What are the shopworn gestures, the easy or predicable endings, the clichés? How may we push harder toward the surprise and the rigorous originality of genuine poetry?

Small Experiments with Radical Intent (Alicia Craven, Kima Jones, Renee Watson, Ramiza Koya, Janine Joseph)

How do you take a small experiment and make it successful, creating radical change in our literary landscape? How do you balance risk-taking with smart planning when it comes to initiating projects that could transform opportunities for communities who may not otherwise have access? Panelists will discuss how they took an experiment and built it into an institution, sharing insights and best practices.

Smells like Teen Spirit: Writing Pop Music as Resistance in Poetry (Kendra DeColo, Tiana Clark, Adrian Matejka, Chet Weise, Hanif Willis-Abdurraqib)

What do poems inspired by Rihanna’s BBHMM and a Grecian Urn have in common? How does the relationship between pop music and poetry subvert/expand the tradition of ekphrasis? In this panel five poets will discuss the influence of pop music on their writing, examining how their poems internalize the aesthetics of defiance/resistance inherent in music they love. They will read from work that looks at the ways pop deepens/troubles our notions of identity and desire to create urgent works of art.

Sound and Fury: Understanding Voice in Fiction (John Fried, Irina Reyn, Emily Mitchell, Allison Amend)

When it comes to fiction, what is voice? Is it simply characters talking to one another? Or is it related to tone or diction? And how do you teach it? This panel of experienced teachers and writers will consider where voice comes from, as well as how to use voice to play with narration, point of view, and style in your work.

Sound Makes Sense: Reading the Lyric Sentence (Pearl Abraham, David James Poissant, Annie DeWitt, Alan Sincic, Baylea Jones)

Poets think in lines, prose writers in sentences; the best of both work from sound to sense, with an ear for the music in their compositions. This panel celebrates lyricism in prose, the play and craft at work in the artful sentence. Panelists perform close readings of great favorite sentences, discussing rhythm and breath, pauses and stops, and then on to the rhetorical strategies at work, the use of repetition, inversion, interruption, afterthought, pile- up, aside, and more.

The "So What?" Factor: Making Meaning in Personal Essays and Memoir (Jericho Parms, Kate McCahill, Tim Hillegonds, Miles Harvey, Michele Morano)

Often in creative nonfiction writing telling well-crafted stories from our lives isn’t enough. Readers crave perspective, insight, interpretation, and sometimes researched information. This panel will discuss ways of crafting essays and memoir that move beyond “What happened?” to answer, at least implicitly, “So what?”

The Speculative Essay (Robin Hemley, Nicole Walker, Lawrence Lenhart, Leila Philip, Lily Hoang)

Essayists have long employed speculation, relating nothing verifiable, rather than engaging “fact.” Some even delve into the realm of the fiction writer, overturning traditional notions of point of view in the essay. Still, the discourse surrounding nonfiction too often focuses on truth versus lies, a reductive discussion that ignores the myriad imaginative possibilities of nonfiction. This panel moves the discussion forward, pointing to the ways in which speculation is important to the form.

Speculative Nonfiction: the Act of Invention in the Context of Reality (Amy Benson, Suzanne Paola, Kiese Laymon, Sabrina Orah Mark, Elissa Washuta)

The panel will define speculative nonfiction as writing in which actual or verifiable material is not at war with material invented/extrapolated/speculated/fantasized. In this nonfiction territory, invention does not negate actuality, but expands its truth and its uses. The authors will examine why and how nonfiction writers use speculation, then consider the repercussions, politics, and epistemology of mixing what is true with what is possible or even impossible.

Spotlight on Independent Literary Printers (Brent Cunningham, Jonnie Bryant, Nicole Baxter, Nate Zaur)

Some of the finest independent printers in the US specializing in smaller runs of literary books will answer questions, show samples, and discuss some key printing issues and perspectives.

Stay In Your Lane Or... (Timothy Seibles, Remica Bingham-Risher, Cornelius Eady, Quenton Baker, Shara McCallum)

Black poets are often frustrated by assumptions about their subject matter and modes of expression: you're spoken word, you're jazz, you're hood, you're the black experience. However, their work springs from a network of surprising intersections engaging every known literary territory. What fuels the resistance to these intricate realities of black poetry? Are there implications for pedagogy? The panel will address this and share works that contradict limiting assumptions.

Still in the Trenches: Gender, Race, Class in Creative Writing (Jennifer Kwon Dobbs Kwon Dobbs, V.V. Ganeshananthan, Taiyon Coleman, Lisa Lewis, Aimee Parkison)

With the rise of creative writing spaces centering women/writers of color, are gender, race, and class finished conversations? This panel brings together diverse women writers to ask how these social forces continue to shape women's experiences of creative writing from learning in or teaching the workshop to publishing work to administering a program. Where are we today with regard to positions of power and our access to publication? The panelists will share visions and strategies for equity.

STRANGER AND TRUTHIER THAN TRUTH: FICTION IN THE AGE OF TRUMP (Manuel Gonzales, Helen Phillips, Angela Flournoy, Kelly Link, Marie-Helene Bertino)

There's an increasing movement to combat the turbulent political climate with non-fiction essays and personally revealing hot takes. However, fantasy worlds can act as society's mirror just as acutely. Part of resisting can be frivolity and a refusal to eschew whimsy. In a post-fact world, the most equipped soldiers can be those who deal in making it up. Award-winning fiction writers will talk about why the "lie" of fiction matters now, and how fiction can be truthier than truth.

Strong Medicine: The Poetry of Addiction (Dawn McGuire, Kaveh Akbar, Lynn Emanuel, Owen Lewis, Nick Flynn)

From Horace to Hass, poets have both lauded and vilified getting high. The “milk of paradise” can lead to masterworks, while addiction deserts ambition and destroys lives. In this panel, five award-winning poets, including two physician-poets, explore the swerve from inspiration to ruination from different perspectives and diverse writing styles. Themes of addiction in self, family, mentors, patients—e.g. post 9/11 veterans—as well as the seductive intimacy of shared intoxication, are featured.

Structuring the Novel: Methods, Approaches, Ideas (Janet Fitch, Lindsey Drager, Christian Kiefer, Matthew Salesses, Derek Palacio)

The methods of structuring book-length fiction are as numerous as they are difficult, especially in an era where the very idea of the "novel" is being called into question. Bringing together a diverse group of panelists with very different methods of structure, this panel strives to offer concrete answers to your structuring questions. What method might work best for the novel you are writing? How best to move forward? To outline or not to outline? How much to plan?

Successful Author Events at Libraries, Bookstores, Schools, and Literary Centers (Sarah Nicolas, Reba Gordon, Racquel Henry, Kim Britt, Kimberly Galor)

Learn the secrets of planning and executing successful author events from representatives of a major library system, an indie bookstore, a chain bookstore, a school media center, and a literary center. We’ll provide advice to both authors and event planners on coordinating author events of every size. From readings to launch parties to multi-author festivals, discover best practices, marketing tips, and the mistakes to avoid.

Sum of the Parts: Creating Cohesion from Fragmented Narratives (Lauren Kay Halloran, Heather Bryant, Matthew Komatsu, Sonya Lea, Susanne Paola Antonetta)

Nonfiction writers rely on memory, our own and others’. Yet memory is inherently fragmented and made more so by experiences like trauma and illness. Incorporating secondary source material can enhance but complicate the narrative. Five writers who have encountered issues of memory and fragmentation personally and in working with under-represented populations discuss challenges and strategies for bridging—or embracing—these gaps and tying together disparate pieces to create a cohesive narrative.

The Suspense is Killing Me! (Michael Kardos, Kelly Magee, Phong Nguyen, Susan Perabo, Christopher Coake)

“Suspense” is too often dismissed as a genre, akin to thriller or mystery, when in fact it is an important element of all kinds of fiction, and often central to what makes a story or novel compelling to read. These five panelists will discuss the role of suspense in fiction (theirs and others’) and offer suggestions to generate suspense in a wide range of fiction. “Must-read” recommendations, helpful exercises, and a Q&A will round out the session.

Sustainable: On Writing Long and Linked Poems (Kathryn Nuernberger, Jenny Molberg, Cortney Lamar Charleston, Jacques J. Rancourt, Traci Brimhall)

In an age of digestible snippets, we grow hungry for occasions to practice the fine art of paying attention. An art form rooted in mindfulness, the long poem is one way of practicing deliberate attention. Drawing on their own experiences writing and publishing long poems, linked poems, project books, and novels-in-verse, this panel will discuss both the rich literary tradition of long and linked poems, as well as provide insights into the process and craft of creating your own sustained lyrics.

Taking it International: Undergrads on Creating a Multimedia Zine Read Outside the U.S. (Cheyenne Mikailli, Joseph Fortuno, Mohammed Zaid Shaikh, July Westhale, Soma Mei Sheng Frazier)

Students and faculty from a diverse polytechnical college - not literature-focused, but ranked 23 in the Princeton Review's 2017 "Top 50 Undergraduate Schools to Study Game Design" - share how they utilized technology to take an undergrad'-staffed, multimedia literary zine international. They explain interdisciplinary on-campus collabos; getting written up in the U.K. Daily Mail; and how to snag literary contest judges like Juan Felipe Herrera, Daniel Handler, Glynn Washington and A. Van Jordan.

The Teaching Press: Bringing Professional Literary Publishing into the Classroom (Holms Troelstrup, Steve Halle, Deanna Baringer, Emily L. Smith , Ross Tangedal)

Lookout Books at UNC–Wilmington, PRESS 254 at Illinois State University, BatCat Press at Lincoln Park Performing Arts in Pennsylvania, and Cornerstone Press at UW–Stevens Point utilize literary presses as teaching tools for graduate, undergraduate, and secondary students, emphasizing hands-on experience in literary publishing. Panelists detail important practical and curricular concerns in establishing and maintaining a teaching press, as well as the local and national impact of their work.

Tearing Down Societal & Family Myths in Creative Writing (Kaylie Jones, Laurie Jean Cannady, Sue William Silverman, J. Patrick Redmond, Xu Xi)

Writers who address family or societal dysfunction have learned the hard way that the more profound the dysfunction, the more violently and determinedly people will fight to protect the myth of normalcy. What writer has not been told, "Don't air the dirty laundry in public"? This panel of memoir and fiction writers will address some of the myths they've confronted in their work, and methods they've used to overcome the wall of resistance they've encountered from both family and society.

Tearing Down Walls: The International Experience in Low-Residency MFA Programs (Kathleen Driskell, Robin Talbot, Neal Walsh, Janet Pocorobba)

This panel will explore the variety of international programming offered by low-residency MFAs and seek to understand how such programs work and to what end. We will ask: what role does literary citizenship play in the education of a writer? How can international experiences enrich our students’ writing, especially in light of recent talk of travel bans and building walls? How might the low-res MFA program be uniquely positioned to espouse such a mission?

TECHNO BLACK: CONNECTING THE MOBILE READER TO GLOBALLY DIVERSE WRITERS (Kadija George, Tim Fielder, Max Rodriguez, Suban Nur Cooley, Ibrahim Ahmad)

Even as publishers turn towards more culturally and geographically diverse black writers, often at the expense of long-established and ‘matured’ local markets, a burgeoning mobile black reader market is about to explode. If there is anything to be learned from the most recent 20-year interest in the Black experience through books is that we can no longer place the telling of Black stories solely in the hands of traditional publishing.

Telling the Truth Through Fiction: Storytelling in the Aftermath of Genocide and Atrocity (Jan Freeman, Elizabeth Rosner, Natashia Deon, Aline Ohanesian)

The novel's role in conveying political, religious, racial, and cultural truths is often maligned. Yet imaginative methods rescue testimony beyond borders of time and place. Writers on the Holocaust and other 20th century genocides face a threshold in which firsthand eyewitnesses are dying. Panelists will discuss the strengths and pitfalls of fiction vs. memoir, and present the strategies and tools they use as novelists writing about the Holocaust, the Armenian genocide, and U.S. slavery.

TELLING THE WHOLE TRUTH: REFRACTING LANGUAGES AND PERSPECTIVES THAT ARE RARELY TRANSLATED (Aviya Kushner , Niloufar Talebi, Diana Arterian, Lida Nosrati)

The term "world literature" can be misleading -- so many languages are left out. As translators of languages that rarely appear in English, we are concerned that even ardent advocates of world literature are participating in marginalization. Middle Eastern voices, female, and working-class perspectives are often rare and deeply misunderstood. Translators of such voices discuss how to carve out a rightful and non-fetishized space and advocate for change.

Tending the Flourishing: What Sustains Undergraduate Creative Writing Programs (John Estes, Rachel Jamison Webster, Gary Fincke, Emily Rosko)

No doubt creative writing is popular; its growth over the last decade has likely helped save the English major. What are students seeking in CW? And what exactly goes into building an undergraduate creative writing curriculum and sustaining that community? Beyond teaching and mentoring, what behind-the-scenes work is required? This panel of writer-directors, from both public and private institutions, will discuss innovations and pitfalls of tending undergraduate creative writing programs.

That Ticking Clock: the Handling of Time in Fiction, Poetry, and Nonfiction (Cary Holladay, Gary Fincke, Charlotte Holmes, Lorraine Lopez, Rick Mulkey)

“What is time?” wrote Thomas Mann. “It is a secret—lacking in substance and yet almighty.” As an element of craft, time is often regarded as a tool of setting, akin to place. Yet it is multidimensional, a mysterious voyage through past, present, and future. Its handling requires shrewd attention. Panelists will explore chronology management and will offer approaches to the evocation of an instant, an eternity, or the present, deemed by T.S. Eliot “the still point of the turning world.”

The Thing Builders: Building Literary Communities That Matter (Amanda Johnston, JP Howard, Janna Marlies Maron, Penny Guisinger)

Building a literary thing takes more than money. It takes vision, determination, and faith that, somehow, it will be worth it. Conferences, courses, publications, and socio-political movements are opportunities for writers to find each other, share and improve skills, and create social change. As “thing-builders” who are supporting their own careers while supporting other writers, panelists will share how and why they do it in this time of almost limitless competition and scarce resources.

There’s Waldo!: Marketing a First Book (Rosamond King, Jane Friedman, Nicole Dewey, Jeffrey Lependorf)

Marketing an author’s first book presents particular challenges. Hear industry experts and a successful emerging writer share strategies on creating author platforms utilizing both new digital tools and tried-and-true approaches, as well as tips for writers and publishers on how they can best work together to make a new book known.

Think Global, Act Local: Literary Organizations Bridging Communities (Kathleen Martin, Scott Cunningham, Lisa Roney, Mario Ariza, TC Jones)

A community fostered by the arts happens with planning, time, and strategy. The founder of O, Miami and editors from four acclaimed, national-reaching Florida journals show how to use literary citizenship to build relationships with local communities where arts scenes are new and growing. By working with local arts organizations, hosting community events, and targeting both local and national audiences in social media, these organizations bolster their local arts scenes, and themselves.

This is Not a Memoir: Thoughts on the Linked Essay Collection (Sarah Viren, Angela Morales, Kristen Radke, Ryan Van Meter, Elissa Washuta)

What does it mean to publish—or read—a collection of linked essays? How is this nonfiction form different than a traditional essay collection or a memoir? And what characteristics, if any, does it share with a linked story collection? In this panel, writers and editors of linked essay collections will discuss the what and how of writing and publishing a linked essay collection, and why they didn’t just write a memoir.

This is Scary and Here We Go: Fear In The Driver’s Seat (Michele Filgate, Megan Stielstra, Porochista Khakpour , Wendy C. Ortiz, Morgan Parker)

Our work as writers has never felt more urgent—or more terrifying. Fear is an inevitable part of the writing process—risk, rejection, impostor syndrome—but in our current political climate, it can feel almost paralyzing. How do we write under threats to our bodies, our livelihoods, our lives? How do we write through our own self-doubt? In this lively and honest conversation, five writers will examine how fear both holds them back and drives them forward, despite and sometimes because of it.

Tikkun Olam: Jewish Poets on Mending the World (Robin Schaer, Joy Katz, Erika Meitner, Matthew Zapruder, Rosebud Ben-Oni)

Dating back 2000 years, the concept of Tikkun Olam conveys a responsibility among Jews to help repair the world. This panel will explore how Jewish poets interpret that ethical commandment in their work and balance the solitude of writing with social engagement and activism. Panelists will discuss the particular ways poetry can (and can’t) respond to cultural and environmental crisis, and how writers can, as Grace Paley exhorts, “go forth with fear and courage and rage to save the world.”

Tips and Tricks for Working with Online Booksellers (Brent Cunningham, Julie Schaper, Marie Gauthier, Janice Worthen)

This panel will explore how publishers, and to some extent authors, can maximize the sales and availability of their titles at some of the world's largest online booksellers.  The focus will be on understanding how that particular market functions and what its special limitations are.

To the Left of Time: A Tribute to Thomas Lux (Travis Denton, Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Alan Shapiro, Ginger Murchison, Stuart Dischell)

Thomas Lux was among the most influential poets in contemporary American poetry. Over his more than forty-year career as poet and teacher, he published sixteen collections of poems, helped to define some of the most celebrated writing programs in the United States, and mentored thousands of students. His friends Stuart Dischell, Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Alan Shapiro, Katie Chaple, Ginger Murchison, and Travis Denton celebrate Lux’s life and work.

Toad Press International Chapbook series celebrates 15 years of translation (Genevieve Kaplan, Seth Michelson, Paul Cunningham, Tiffany Higgins, Katherine Hedeen)

The Toad Press International chapbook series is proud to celebrate its 15th year publishing literary translation. Join the press’s publisher, alongside translators and authors, for a reading and discussion celebrating the exciting and necessary work of contemporary literary translation. Featured translators continue to publish widely, working from languages including Portuguese, Spanish, and Swedish.

Towards Truth and Brevity: All About Creative Nonfiction Chapbooks (Randon Billings Noble, Chelsea Biondolillo , Bernard Grant, Penny Guisinger, BJ Hollars)

Chapbooks aren’t just for poets anymore. For creative nonfiction writers they can be a focused meditation on a single subject, an experiment in content or form, a micro collection of essays, a stepping-stone to a full-length work, a place of play, an art object. This panel will discuss different ways of crafting CNF chapbooks, including different forms, style at the sentence level, where to submit, what to expect, and how chapbooks can fit into a larger and longer writing project.

Translating Asian Prose (Charles Waugh, Michelle Kyoko Crowson, Anothai Kaewkaen, Bonnie Chau)

Four accomplished translators, working in Chinese, Japanese, Thai, and Vietnamese, discuss the difficulties posed by translating Asian prose. Covering topics such as rendering vernacular and regional dialects, conveying humor, handling challenges arising from logographic and alphasyllabary words and grammars, and considering the political consequences of the work, this panel reveals insights into translating languages and genres underrepresented in US publishing and at AWP.

Translating Blackness (John Keene, Lawrence Schimel, Kristin Dykstra, Tiffany Higgins)

This panel refers to a widely read 2016 commentary by John Keene, who challenged the literary world to support more translations of works by African and African diasporic writers. Our panel features translators who recently brought out works from Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean. We’ll discuss insights on language, culture and power from these books. As a group we ask what becomes audible through translation’s close listening, and how a translator’s identity and strategies matter.