SOURCE: Library of Congress
AUGUST 22, 2017
2017 National Book Festival Is a Literature Adventure for Kids of All Ages
Press Contact: Gayle Osterberg (202) 707-0020 | Sheryl Cannady (202) 707-6456
Public Contact: National Book Festival Information (888) 714-4696, bookfest@loc.gov
From a great lineup of authors—including more than 40 who write for children and teens—to special guests like Captain Underpants and new, exciting activities designed to delight and inform, the 2017 Library of Congress National Book Festival will be a literature adventure for kids of all ages. The 17th National Book Festival will be held at the Washington Convention Center from 9 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. (doors open at 8:30 a.m. ET) on Saturday, Sept. 2. The event is free and open to the public. The Convention Center Expo Floor (located on the lower level in Halls A, B and C) will include two dedicated children’s stages and family-friendly activities from the Library of Congress and festival sponsors.
Families should start the day by picking up a children’s guide to the festival at the Expo Floor information booth and both Children’s stages (also available online at loc.gov/bookfest/). The guide, created by the Mensa Foundation and the Library Congress for the sixth year, provides tips on where to go and what to see.
Among the many children’s authors appearing at the festival are Newbery Medalist Kwame Alexander; Lincoln Peirce, author of the uber-popular Big Nate series for kids; two-time Newbery Medal winner Kate DiCamillo; Dav Pilkey, beloved creator of Captain Underpants; and best-selling teens author Angie Thomas.
Festivalgoers can learn about the Library’s diverse collections and services through engaging talks and performances by curators and entertainers at the Library of Congress Town Square. Family-friendly presentations include trivia sessions, an interactive maze illustration by Joe Wos, a special session with illustrator Roz Chast and appearances by the recently announced 2017 National Student Poets, five outstanding youth poets from across the nation for their original work. Library curators will showcase their collections with children’s and teens’ activities throughout the day.
Celebrate the joy and importance of reading with a visit to the Literacy Corner, presented by the Library of Congress Literacy Awards Program, from 8:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. Parents, children, caregivers and educators can write or videotape a message to their favorite author at the Letters about Literature table. Festivalgoers also can grab a cape and transform themselves into a literacy superhero at the Library Superhero-selfie booth. They can bring a friend for a game of Book Bean-Bag Toss and learn more about award-winning organizations that promote literacy worldwide.
The Library’s Educational Outreach team makes learning fun for kids, families and teachers with activities featuring books, primary sources and giveaways at the Kids & Teachers – Read & Learn booth. Visitors can solve puzzles, share their favorite book titles and demonstrate their artistic and writing abilities. Inspired by the 30th anniversary of “Where’s Waldo?,” the Library is hosting a hide-and-seek game, featuring historic images from the Library’s collections, and partnering with Candlewick Press for a fun hunt for three Waldos hidden on the Expo Floor. Look for this elusive traveler, enter to win a prize and share your photo with Waldo @NatBookFest #ifoundwaldo.
Kids with a nose for adventure will also delight in taking photos with Candlewick Press characters Maisy the loveable mouse and Nutbrown Hare. Both characters will make appearances at the festival.
Charter Sponsor Wells Fargo returns this year with children’s storytimes every half hour from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. at the Wells Fargo Pavilion. The sponsor is also bringing out its D.C. Scores Zone, a fun place for people to celebrate soccer and learn more about D.C. United and meet the team mascot, Talon. As usual, the Wells Fargo Stagecoach and hands-on history activities also will be on-site. Wells Fargo will provide ASL interpretation all day.
Attendees can interact with representatives from their home states and learn about each state’s literary heritage from 8:30 a.m. until 5 p.m. in the Pavilion of the States. The Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), with additional funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), makes it possible for an affiliate of the Library’s Center for the Book in each of the 50 states, the District of Columbia and the U.S. territories to participate in the festival. The “Discover Great Places Through Reading” brochure offers a list of 52 great reads and a map for kids that encourages them to visit all 52 affiliates to get a unique sticker or stamp. Many of these books will be for sale in the festival bookstore.
Kids who collect all 52 stickers from the Pavilion of the States can pick up a special prize at the Junior League of Washington (JLW) table. JLW returns this year as the Library’s primary partner for volunteer support, a role the organization has played since 2003. More than 400 JLW volunteers will manage the book-signing lines and staff other locations throughout the festival. More information about JLW’s mission and literacy focus can be found at the organization’s table the day of the festival.
Celebrate literature with The Washington Post through an exciting series of activities. Families are invited to attend animated readings by local children’s book authors every hour from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. and pick up color-your-own bookmarks throughout the day. The Post’s mascot, Ned the Newshound, will make a special appearance from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. to pose for photos with festivalgoers.
As part of the Post’s longstanding partnership with the festival as a charter sponsor, more than 20 Washington Post journalists and editors will moderate discussions with authors. A special stand-alone edition of the Post’s “Book World” covering festival programming will be available at the information booth and at the Post Pavilion.
Visitors will be able to celebrate and engage with the humanities at the National Endowment for the Humanities booth. Attendees can see demonstrations of Walden, a first-person video game that re-creates the life and experiences of Henry David Thoreau at his enclave on Walden Pond. Posters, bookmarks, reading challenges, book lists and resource guides are available for librarians, teachers and readers of all ages. Pose with cutouts of historical figures Jane Austen, Frederick Douglass and Alexander Hamilton. A. Scott Berg, editor of “World War I and America” and the biographer of Woodrow Wilson and Charles Lindbergh, will also stop by in the afternoon.
Scholastic returns to the festival with an array of activities, giveaways and live-poetry performances the whole family can enjoy. Festivalgoers can pose for photos with their favorite literary characters, including Clifford the Big Red Dog®, Captain Underpants and Dog Man. Families will also enjoy the Reading Corner, featuring exciting new books and engaging read- alouds every hour from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Reading is Fundamental (RIF) will have fun giveaways, including bookmarks, stickers, pens and totes. Visitors will learn about current programs and experience Literacy Central, RIF’s new, free digital portal with thousands of activities, games, reading passages and lesson plans designed to help parents and educators foster a love of reading and build literacy development in children. They can also enter a raffle for one of RIF’s classroom book collections.
The White House Historical Association will feature American historian William Seale and photographer Bruce White in their booth all day signing books and answering questions about the president’s house. Seale and White also will be on the Library of Congress Town Square stage at 2:35 p.m. and 4:30 p.m. to discuss their collaboration on the Association’s award-winning books on the history of the White House and the president’s neighborhood. The booth also will have free copies of White House History, the association’s quarterly journal. Contributors to the publication will be in attendance to answer questions.
The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) sponsors the Poetry & Prose stage of author presentations (Room 145AB), which will again feature readings by and discussions with award-winning writers and poets, many of whom have received NEA Literature Fellowships. The Poetry & Prose stage will open with performances by student champions from Poetry Out Loud, an NEA and Poetry Foundation program in which high-school students memorize and perform classic and contemporary poems in competition.
The Library of Congress Poetry and Literature Center and the poetry organization Split This Rock will present the National Book Festival Youth Poetry Slam in Teens at 6 p.m., showcasing some of the nation’s top youth slam groups. Champion delegates from these groups will compete to be named top youth slammer by performing new works on books and reading.
Authors with fans of all ages will discuss their books on the Graphic Novels stage in the West Salon from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. The program will be presented with the assistance of the Small Press Expo and moderated by Washington Post Comic Riffs author Michael Cavna.
C-SPAN2’s Book TV will broadcast live from this year’s National Book Festival—as it has been for every festival. Its coverage of the festival will include author presentations and author call-in segments from the Book TV set. The network will also provide its ever-popular festival bag—this year in purple—available at information booths, the bookstore and outside the History & Biography stage.
PBS Book View Now, the nationally distributed book and author channel, will provide seven hours of live coverage at the 2017 National Book Festival. Book View Now’s live-stream presentation will air from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET at BookViewNow.org and PBS.org. Coverage will be hosted by Book View Now’s executive producer, Rich Fahle.
NPR will be part of the festival throughout the day, with many of its well-known hosts, correspondents and critics introducing and interviewing authors.
These are just some of the great activities planned for the National Book Festival. Follow festival activities at loc.gov/bookfest or download the National Book Festival app for all the latest information.
The National Book Festival is made possible by the generous support of private- and public-sector sponsors who share the Library’s commitment to reading and literacy, led by National Book Festival Co-Chairman David M. Rubenstein. Charter Sponsors include the Institute of Museum and Library Services, The James Madison Council, The Washington Post and Wells Fargo; Patron sponsor is the National Endowment for the Arts; the Contributor-level sponsors are Thomas V. Girardi, Beverly and Lyman Hamilton, the National Endowment for the Humanities, Scholastic Inc. and the Junior League of Washington; and, in the Friends category, Booklovers Circle members, Candlewick Press, Marshall B. Coyne Foundation Inc., Democracy Fund, Joseph and Lynn Deutsch, Embassy of Ireland, Embassy of Sweden, The Hay-Adams, J.J. Medveckis Foundation, Mensa Foundation, the Mexican Cultural Institute, Timothy and Diane Naughton, Reading Is Fundamental, the Nora Roberts Foundation, Patricia Glass Schuman and Vincent Civello, Small Press Expo (SPX), Split This Rock and the White House Historical Association. Media Partners are C-SPAN2’s Book TV, NPR and PBS Book View Now. Those interested in supporting the National Book Festival can contact the Library at devofc@loc.gov.
The Library of Congress is the world’s largest library, offering access to the creative record of the United States—and extensive materials from around the world—both on-site and online. It is the main research arm of the U.S. Congress and the home of the U.S. Copyright Office. Explore collections, reference services and other programs and plan a visit at loc.gov, access the official site for U.S. federal legislative information at congress.gov and register creative works of authorship at copyright.gov.
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PR 17-115
2017-08-22
ISSN 0731-3527
https://www.loc.gov/item/prn-17-115/
AUGUST 3, 2017
Library Announces Complete Lineup of Authors for 2017 National Book Festival
David McCullough, Condoleezza Rice, Kate DiCamillo, Scott Turow, Ernest Gaines and More Than 100 Additional Authors
Press Contact: Gayle Osterberg (202) 707-0020
Public Contact: National Book Festival Information (888) 714-4696
Website: National Book Festival
Book lovers of all ages will find something to enjoy at the 2017 Library of Congress National Book Festival on Saturday, Sept. 2. A star-studded and diverse lineup of more than 100 authors, illustrators and poets will be presenting from the festival stages at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, D.C., from 9:30 a.m. until 7:30 p.m. Doors to the convention center will open at 8:30 a.m.
A few festival highlights:
The eminent historian and Pulitzer Prize-winner David McCullough will open the festival’s Main Stage, which features six other best-selling authors and allows seating for more than 2,500. He will discuss his new book, “The American Spirit: Who We Are and What We Stand For.”
Dav Pilkey, beloved creator of Captain Underpants, will delight with his latest story, “Dog Man: A Tale of Two Kitties,” on the Children’s Purple Stage.
On the Children’s Green Stage, two-time Newbery Medal winner Kate DiCamillo will discuss her latest novel, “Raymie Nightingale.”
Newbery Medalist Kwame Alexander and Mary Rand Hess will talk to teens about their poetic verse novel, “Solo.” The Teens Stage will conclude with one of the festival’s most popular events, a poetry slam.
In Contemporary Life, Roxane Gay promises to offer an unvarnished discussion of what it’s like to be fat (her preferred term) in a world that prizes the body beautiful.
National Book Award winner Alice McDermott will be on the Fiction Stage, offering another of her tales of the Irish in America, this time in the 1940s and ’50s, with the launch of a new novel, “The Ninth Hour.”
A story that most Americans never knew was the subject of “Hidden Figures” by Margot Lee Shetterly. She will be on the History & Biography Stage, which will also offer a panel of authors focusing on the legacy of John F. Kennedy in this 100th anniversary year of his birth.
Fans of Ernest Hemingway will not want to miss the panel of Mary Dearborn (“Ernest Hemingway: A Biography”), Paul Hendrickson (“Hemingway’s Boat: Everything He Loved in Life, and Lost”) and Nicholas Reynolds (“Writer, Sailor, Soldier Spy: Ernest Hemingway’s Secret Adventures”) on the Poetry & Prose Stage. The distinguished author of “A Lesson Before Dying,” Ernest Gaines, also will speak about “The Tragedy of Brady Sims,” his new novel, launching at the festival.
Longtime best-selling writer Scott Turow has just published a new legal thriller, “Testimony.” He will be on the Thrillers & Fantasy Stage, as will science-fiction master John Scalzi, with “The Collapsing Empire.”
Finally, the popular Graphic Novels Stage will feature “Big Nate” author Lincoln Peirce, hilarious New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast and National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature Gene Luen Yang.
A complete schedule, along with other information, is available at loc.gov/bookfest/schedule/.
The Library has launched an updated National Book Festival app, which provides a festival-at-your-fingertips experience with the complete schedule of author talks, book signings, special presentations and fun activities. Users can plan their full day’s personalized schedule in advance, receive bulletin-style notifications on-site in the event of schedule or location changes on the day of the festival, and more. The app also includes sponsor information, general festival guidelines and frequently asked questions.
The app, available at no charge for iOS and Android users, can be found at loc.gov/apps. Also follow the festival on Twitter @librarycongress with hashtag #NatBookFest. Subscribe to the National Book Festival blog here: go.usa.gov/xXkJn.
The National Book Festival is made possible by the generous support of private- and public- sector sponsors who share the Library’s commitment to reading and literacy, led by National Book Festival Co-Chairman David M. Rubenstein. Charter sponsors include the Institute of Museum and Library Services, The James Madison Council, The Jeffersonian Fund, The Washington Post and Wells Fargo; Patron sponsor is the National Endowment for the Arts; the Contributor-level sponsors are Thomas V. Girardi, Beverly and Lyman Hamilton, the National Endowment for the Humanities, Scholastic Inc. and the Junior League of Washington; and, in the Friends category, Candlewick Press, Marshall B. Coyne Foundation Inc., Joseph and Lynn Deutsch, Embassy of Ireland, Embassy of Sweden, The Hay-Adams, J.J. Medveckis Foundation, Mensa Foundation, the Mexican Cultural Institute, Timothy and Diane Naughton, Reading Is Fundamental, the Nora Roberts Foundation, Patricia Glass Schuman and Vincent Civello and the White House Historical Association. Media Partners are C-SPAN2’s Book TV and NPR. Those interested in supporting the National Book Festival can contact the Library at devofc@loc.gov.
Following is the complete author lineup for the 2017 Library of Congress National Book Festival:
Main Stage: David Baldacci, Thomas L. Friedman, Diana Gabaldon, Michael Lewis, David McCullough, Condoleezza Rice, J.D. Vance.
Children’s Purple Stage: Mike Curato, Emma Donoghue, Cynthia Levinson and Sanford Levinson, Shelia P. Moses, Kadir Nelson, Dav Pilkey, Nathaniel Philbrick, Sherri Duskey Rinker and John Rocco, Madelyn Rosenberg and Wendy Wan-Long Shang, Rachel Renee Russell and Nikki Russell, Reshma Saujani, Ronald L. Smith, Javaka Steptoe.
Children’s Green Stage: Letters About Literature: A Book That Shaped Me summer writing contest, Kelly Barnhill, Michael Buckley, Carmen Agra Deedy, Kate DiCamillo, Travis Foster and Ethan Long, Jack Gantos, Amy Sarig King, Verónica Murguía, Ellen Oh with Kwame Alexander, Meg Medina and Tim Tingle, R.J. Palacio, Cokie Roberts, Chris Van Dusen.
Teens Stage: Kwame Alexander and Mary Rand Hess, M.T. Anderson, David Baldacci, Falling in Love panel (Melissa de la Cruz, Sandhya Menon and Nicola Yoon), Growing Up is Hard panel (Kathleen Glasgow and Angie Thomas), Marie Lu, Andrew McCarthy, Tanya Lee Stone, Sabaa Tahir. The stage will close with a poetry slam.
Contemporary Life Stage: Danielle Allen, Graham Allison, Matthew Desmond, Michael Eric Dyson and Ibram X. Kendi in conversation, Roxane Gay, Sam Kean, Mark Kurlansky, Leland Melvin, Siddhartha Mukherjee, Dava Sobel.
Fiction Stage: Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction: Denis Johnson (d. May 24, 2017) – ceremony with prize presentation to his wife Cindy Johnson, Nathan Hill, Katie Kitamura and Hari Kunzru in conversation, Ha Jin, Alice McDermott, Claire Messud, Elizabeth Strout, Colm Tóibín, Amor Towles, Juan Gabriel Vásquez, Jesmyn Ward.
Graphic Novels Stage: Roz Chast, Mike Lester and Ann Telnaes in conversation, Lincoln Peirce, Gene Luen Yang.
History & Biography Stage: Scott Berg, Sidney Blumenthal, Helene Cooper, Peter Cozzens, John A. Farrell, John F. Kennedy 100th anniversary panel (Steven Levingston, Kathy McKeon and Thomas Oliphant), Ben Macintyre, Margot Lee Shetterly, Adm. James Stavridis, Ronald C. White.
Poetry & Prose Stage: Poetry Out Loud, Peter Ho Davies and Lisa Ko in conversation, Ernest Gaines, Julia Glass and Jennifer Haigh in conversation, Ernest Hemingway panel (Mary Dearborn, Paul Hendrickson and Nicholas Reynolds), former Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera, Marie Howe and Adrian Matejka in conversation, Bill Roorbach and Brad Watson in conversation.
Thrillers & Fantasy: Megan Abbott, Chris Bohjalian, Dan Chaon, Jenny Rogneby, John Scalzi, Karin Slaughter, Scott Turow, Don Winslow.
The Library of Congress is the world’s largest library, offering access to the creative record of the United States—and extensive materials from around the world—both on-site and online. It is the main research arm of the U.S. Congress and the home of the U.S. Copyright Office. Explore collections, reference services and other programs and plan a visit at loc.gov; access the official site for U.S. federal legislative information at congress.gov; and register creative works of authorship at copyright.gov.
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PR 17-109
2017-08-03
ISSN 0731-3527
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https://www.loc.gov/item/prn-17-109/