AWP 2022, the annual meeting of the Association of Writers and Writing Programs will be meeting this week in Philadelphia, PA. The AWP Conference and Bookfair is an annual destination for writers, teachers, students, editors, and publishers of contemporary creative writing that includes thousands of attendees, hundreds of events and bookfair exhibitors, and four days of essential literary conversation and celebration.
We are excited to announce that attendees will be able to find many of our PRHSB speakers on AWP 2022’s panels and featured events. Read on for more details!
PRHSB Speakers at AWP 2022
Thursday, March 24th, 2022
12:10pm – Twenty Years of One Story: How We Did It, Sponsored by CLMP, with Hannah Tinti and Maribeth Batcha
Cofounders of the award-winning literary nonprofit, One Story, share the highs, lows, and bumps in the road on their twenty-year journey. Most literary magazines open and fold in three years, but in 2002, Maribeth Batcha and Hannah Tinti launched a tiny zine celebrating the short story and eventually grew their organization into a literary nonprofit that is still going strong. If you’re thinking of launching a lit mag or facing challenges as a small press or literary nonprofit, this is the panel for you!
119AB, Pennsylvania Convention Center, 100 Level
3:20pm – Racially-Conscious Literary Criticism, with Emily Bernard, Erik Gleibermann, and David Mura
Just as astute fiction writers build their racial awareness to portray racial realities outside their own, discerning literary critics can develop such awareness to review books with unfamiliar racial experience. How can critics deepen understanding of an author’s racially informed artistic tradition? Should critics seek editorial guidance to identify potential racial blind spots? This diverse panel brings together critics and creative writers to explore these and other questions.
109AB, Pennsylvania Convention Center, 100 Level
3:20pm – To Lie or Not to Lie? How Writers Choose Between Fiction & Nonfiction, with Beth Nguyen, Adrienne Brodeur, Mira Jacob, Said Sayrafiezadeh, and Joanna Rakoff
How do writers decide between fiction and memoir? How does the process of writing shift when shifting genres? In this panel, writers who have written and published in both genres will discuss the craft choices, ethical questions, research inquiries, and publishing concerns that lie behind each. Rather than approaching the topic as fiction vs. nonfiction, we will offer examples of how to navigate both and encourage people to consider the possibilities that emerge from multigenre writing.
119AB, Pennsylvania Convention Center, 100 Leve
Friday, March 25th, 2022
9:00am – Tell It from All Sides: Writing a Story with Multiple Points of View, with Jean Kwok, Rebecca Makkai, Angie Kim, Julia Phillips, and Danielle Trussoni
Some stories are told from a single point of view, while others are told by many characters who take turns giving us their own (sometimes conflicting) version of events. How do you decide when to use multiple perspectives? Which characters should serve as narrators? And once you’ve decided on multiple perspectives, how do you create voices that are strong and distinct? We will discuss the when, why, and how of writing an effective multiple-POV story to deliver a powerful, layered narrative.
121BC, Pennsylvania Convention Center, 100 Level
1:45pm – Migrants through Time: Novelists Writing across the 20th/21st-Century Divide, with Rebecca Makkai, Tim Horvath, Pitchaya Sudbanthad, Julia Fine, and Marc Fitten
In Exit West, Mohsin Hamid posits that “we are all migrants through time.” In this panel, novelists whose work traverses the border between the 20th and 21st-centuries consider what it means to live and write on both sides of this temporal divide. By examining the legacy of the AIDS crisis, the transformation of a metropolis, the impact of climate change, and the shifting landscapes of art and music, we’ll explore how the 20th century continues to haunt, shape, and reverberate in our own.
122AB, Pennsylvania Convention Center, 100 Level
Saturday, March 26th, 2022
3:20pm – A Reading & Conversation with Rivka Galchen & Ruth Ozeki, Sponsored by the Authors Guild, with Ruth Ozeki, Rivka Galchen, and Zachary Steele
Rivka Galchen’s second novel Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch was a finalist for the 2021 Atwood Gibson Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. Her debut novel Atmospheric Disturbances won the William Saroyan International Prize for Writing and was named to best of the year lists by The New York Times, Salon.com, Slate, and more. Ruth Ozeki’s fourth novel The Book of Form and Emptiness was released in September 2021 and named a best book of the year by outlets including Time and The Guardian. Her 2013 novel A Tale for the Time Being won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the Dos Passos Prize and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and National Books Critics Circle Award. Moderated by Zachary Steele.
This event will be prerecorded and available on the virtual conference platform, in addition to being screened onsite. ASL interpretation and captioning will be provided.
Contact us for more information about booking one of these AWP 2022 speakers for your next literary event.