Friday, October 03, 2008

Brattleboro Literary Festival at Library

The Brattleboro Literary Festival kicks off tomorrow (Saturday) and again for the 7th year we in Brattleboro are happy to host some 34 authors and panelists this weekend.

Check out all of the offerings at the web site. But, pay particular attention to these events:

Discuss Restless Spirit, the award winning young adult biography of Robert Frost, which takes place at 2:15 in the Centre Church's parlor. Humanities scholar, Deborah Luskin, will facilitate the discussion, and Natalie Bober will attend. This event follow the Robert Frost panel at the Centre Church too.

Other events at the library are:
3:45pm - 5:00pm
Beth Kanell and Castle Freeman Brooks Memorial Library
5:15pm - 6:15pm
Mac Maharaj Brooks Memorial Library

Castle Freeman, Jr. is the author of the novel Go With Me, which was published to rave reviews in early 2008. The Boston Globe called it "A gripping, taut tale of suspense . . . a spare, tense novel set within the desolation and desperation of the Vermont woods.” His works also include two previous novels, My Life and Adventures and Judgment Hill, a story collection, The Bride of Ambrose and Other Stories, and a collection of essays. He makes his home in Newfane, Vermont.

Beth Kanell is the author of The Darkness Under the Water, a coming of age story about a sixteen year old half French, half Abenaki girl who lives on a farm in turn of the century Vermont. She slowly realizes that her family and others like them are being targeted by a governmental eugenics effort to rid the state of so-called "poor citizens." A resident of the Northeast Kingdom, Kanell is also a poet and the author of several travel and local history books.

Mac Maharaj is a political activist who worked closely on anti-apartheid activities with Nelson Mandela, with whom he was incarcerated on Robben Island following the Little Rivonia Trial. A member of the South African Communist Party, he secretly transcribed Mandela's memoir Long Walk to Freedom and smuggled it out of prison in 1976. Maharaj is the editor of Mandela: The Authorized Portrait, and he teaches at Bennington College.