More than 1,400 bibliophiles gathered on campus March 2-4 for LitFest 2017, the College’s second annual literary festival that included conversations and book signings with 2016 National Book Award fiction finalists Chris Bachelder and Jacqueline Woodson, internationally renowned author Zadie Smith and Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Doris Kearns Goodwin. Additional activities included master classes, a poetry slam, panel conversations and tours of the Emily Dickinson Museum.
The festival kick off on March 2 featured 2016 National Book Award fiction finalists Jacqueline Woodson, author of Another Brooklyn, and Chris Bachelder, author of The Throwback Special.
Novelist Chris Bachelder hosted a master class with Amherst students in a classroom at the Center for Humanistic Inquiry.
Students enjoyed a master class with renowned author Zadie Smith at the Emily Dickinson Museum.
During a tour of the Emily Dickinson Museum, Zadie Smith paused for a quiet moment of reflection in the poet’s bedroom.
Professor Judith Frank hosted a conversation with Pamela Paul, editor of The New York Times Book Review, and Lisa Lucas, executive director of the National Book Foundation, in the Center for Humanistic Inquiry.
Jane Wald, executive director of the Emily Dickinson Museum, hosted a conversation with Daniel Gallant, executive director of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe; Elizabeth MacDuffie, founding editor of Meat for Tea: The Valley Review; and Richard Michelson, owner of R. Michelson Galleries.
More than 650 students, faculty, staff and local residents gathered in Johnson Chapel for the headline event featuring Zadie Smith on March 3.
Amherst students shared personal and provocative poems during a poetry slam hosted by Daniel Gallant, executive director of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, in the Powerhouse on March 3.
The festival came to a close on March 4 with presidential biographer Doris Kearns Goodwin hosted in conversation by Cullen Murphy ’74, Vanity Fair’s editor at large and chair of the College’s board of trustees.