| Thursday, January 7, 1999 |
| 1:00 - 5:00 p.m. |
Seminar Registration
San Carlos Institute, 516 Duval
Street |
2:00 p.m.
and
4:00 p.m. |
Literary Walking Tours
Delightful one hour, one mile walk provides an intimate glimpse into the writers’ Key West. Meet at
the San Carlos five minutes before walk begins.
|
| 5:00 - 6:30 p.m.
|
Join Photographer Rollie McKenna for a wine reception.
Lucky Steet Gallery, 1120 White Street
Rollie McKenna's Key West—an exhibit of portraits of Key West writers
taken by world renowned photographer Rollie McKenna over the past
thirty years, including among others Alison Lurie, Elizabeth Bishop,
John Malcom Brinnin, and James Merrill. Rollie is dedicating the
exhibit to John Malcolm Brinnin.
"John Malcolm Brinnin was my cherished literary mentor. His recent
death has been a deep sorrow to all who knew him."
"It may be that the best photographs are those which do not speak at
once of the photographer's selectivity and craft. On first looking at
them, we are so taken by the subject as to be unmindful of art: we see
something, and to some extent see into it, as if the only agency were
our own mysteriously heightened powers of perception. Rollie McKennaís
pictures enable me in that way .... The people in McKenna's portraits
are all posing to some extent, and not all are smiling, yet almost all
are responding to a benign concentration and a friendliness which is not
intrusive. The world of Rollie McKenna's portraits, for all the
diversity and difficulty of her subjects is (thanks to her) a warm and
sociable one."
Richard Wilbur on Rollie McKenna
The exhibit will run throughout the seminar. Lucky Street Gallery is a
30 minute walk from the San Carlos Institute or a five minute taxi
ride. A step up into Lucky Street Gallery is a step into a world of
challenging,contemporary art. Many of Key West's best-known
artists--Roberta Marks, John Martini, Dalva Duarte, Molly Goodwin, Tom
Colbert, Kevin Sloan, Susan Sugar—to name just a few—show their
paintings and sculpture here. Lucky Street recently moved to 1120 White
Street, in an area rapidly becoming the locals' and discerning tourists'
favorite shopping destination for art,
antiques, and books. The gallery is open daily from 11-5.
|
| 7:30 p.m. |
Welcome
by David Ethridge, Seminar President
A Remembrance of John Malcolm Brinnin
by Richard Wilbur
The 1999 John Hersey Memorial Lecture, "How
Writers Write"
by E.L. Doctorow
|
| 9:15 - 10:30 p.m. |
Reception
In the garden of the Wreckers’ Museum--the Oldest House, 322 Duval Street. The house was built in 1839 in the
ship’s carpenter fashion of early seafaring in Key West. It’s now
owned and operated by the Old Island Restoration Foundation. Food and
cocktails provided.
|
| Friday, January 8, 1999 |
| 9:00 a.m. |
Coffee and Pastries
|
| 10:00 a.m -Noon |
What’s “American” about the American novel?
A panel discussion followed by audience questions and answers.
What makes a novel American? The setting, the author’s nationality,
thematic concerns? Or is it the language? How is the American novel
being influenced by the ethnic currents and cultures of America? How
do American mythology, American history, our sense of place and space,
shape the American novel? Can we say that American novels are defined
by a common history seen from different points of view?
Moderator: Hilma Wolitzer
with: Jamaica Kincaid, Harry Mathews, Robert Stone,
Amy Tan, John Edgar
Wideman.
|
| Noon |
Lunch Break |
| 1:30 - 3:30 p.m. |
What’s the Difference? (Men and women novelists)
Afternoon Panel Discussion
Do men and women write about different subjects, in different ways, and
for different audiences? Can novelists depict in-depth characters of
the opposite sex convincingly (to the opposite sex)? Has feminism made a
difference to novels by men, as well as by women? Do women novelists
write with a woman reader in mind and men with a man? Are American
gender differences in novels the same as gender differences in foreign
novels?
Moderator: Morgan Entrekin
with: Ann Beattie, Philip Caputo, Alison Lurie,
John Edgar
Wideman.
|
| 4:00 - 4:30 p.m. |
Joseph Heller: My Life as a Writer |
| 4:30 - 5:30 p.m. |
Tea with Joseph Heller
Top of La Concha, 430 Duval
Street |
| 8:00 - 9:00 p.m. |
Joyce Carol Oates, Work in Progress: Intimate Notes on
Novel Writing
Ms. Oates will read from work in progress and discuss her artistic
process.
|
| Saturday, January 9, 1999 |
| 9:00 a.m. |
Coffee and Pastries
|
| 10:00 a.m. - Noon |
What gets the novel going? (Its origin in
language or life)
Panel discussion followed by audience questions and
answers.
Where does the novel begin? Is it in an idea of character? Is it a
lived or observed experience? Or is it an idea that waits for the right
image to take life? Can it be a formal idea, a strategy for writing
that helps create the people and story that fit? Panelists may wish to
read a passage to trace back a novel’s origin. Does the origin vary for
the same novelist with different books?
Moderator: Susan Shreve
with: Joseph Heller, Jamaica Kincaid, Harry Mathews,
Amy Tan
|
| Noon |
Lunch Break |
| 1:30 - 3:30 p.m. |
The Problem with Reality (Choosing styles)
Afternoon panel discussion.
“It is unnerving to consider that the underside of our current, divided
national consciousness may be beyond the imaginative powers of even our
best novelists.”
A.O. Scott
How can American life be depicted by realism since it is, in setting and
society, so exaggerated, so surreal? Isn’t some other style,
impressionistic or expressionistic a better fit? How do panelists
define their styles? What decisions do they make about style as they
begin writing? Does this change during writing?
Moderator: Hilma Wolitzer
with: Peter Matthiessen, Joyce Carol Oates, Robert Stone,
Kurt Vonnegut,
John Edgar
Wideman
|
| 4:00 - 4:30 p.m. |
Peter Matthiessen Mr. Matthiessen will read from his work in progress Bone
By Bone, the third volume of the Watson Trilogy (to be published in
April).
|
| 5:00 - 5:30 p.m. |
Tea with Peter Matthiessen
Top of La Concha, 430 Duval
Street
|
| 7:00 - 8:00 p.m. |
Writing Between the Lines
A conversation between Amy Tan and her editor, Faith Sale.
|
| 8:30 - 10:30 p.m. |
Reception
at the East Martello Museum.
Join the authors at the East Martello Museum for a gala reception.
The museum is one of the three former Civil War era forts built on Key
West and the Dry Tortugas. Folk art by Stanley Papio and Mario
Sanchez, historical Key West artifacts and a writers’ room are included
in the permanent collection.
Enjoy the sounds of Melody Cooper as she sings from her great
American Songbook. Melody Cooper is a popular Key West pianist/vocalist
whose recent credits include a successful run of her original one woman
show Torch! at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Along with her
appearances on the jazz circuit and with the unique chamber ensemble,
Bach to Bassa Nova, Melody can also be found engineering behind the
scenes at Private Ear Recording Studio (which is once again running
sound for the Key West Literary Seminar).
Those needing transportation please meet at the San Carlos at 8:15
for trolley service.
|
| Sunday, January 10, 1999 |
| 9:00 a.m. |
Coffee and Pastries
|
| 10:00 a.m. - Noon |
Talking of War (War’s effects on the American Novel)
Panel Discussion followed by audience questions and
answers.
War has had a watershed effect on the American novel: the existential
influence of disaffection and alienation; the social reorientation in
the new mix of mass enlistment and draft; the end of Depression
politics and a new optimism, cynicism, and irony.
Did WWII actually change the novel more than Vietnam did? In retrospect,
does the effect of WWII on the novel seem to be merely a continuation of
the effect of WWI? Has media awareness of the conditions of war made
new demands on novelists? Has a technology of instant war imagery
changed the war novel? What has compelled panelists to write about
war?
with: Philip Caputo, Joseph Heller, Robert Stone,
Kurt Vonnegut
|
| Noon |
Reception
at the Key West Library sponsored by the Key West Friends of the Library (corner of Elizabeth and Fleming Streets)
A conversation with Judy Blume
|
2:00 - 4:00 p.m.
Concurrent afternoon panel discussions
(Please note: the following two panels are free and open to
the public. Seating is on a first-come, first-served
basis) |
Is the Novel dead, dying, or just a smaller slice of the
verbal pie?
Do contemporary Americans have as much time for novels as before? How
does the novel compete for attention against the shortened attention
span of television, computer, and sound byte? To what degree did the
novel ever shape the intellectual texture of American life? Has the
novel itself been influenced by other forms of communication such as
film? Are memoir and “faction” good, bad or indifferent for the novel?
Where is the American novel at the end of the twentieth century? Where
is it going? Do stories matter?
Moderator: Susan Shreve
with: Joseph Heller, Jamaica Kincaid, Harry Mathews,
Joyce Carol Oates
Publishing: How changes have affected American novelists.
(This panel will be offered at the Waterfront Theatre in Mallory Square)
What happened to the period between the first novel and the
“breakthrough,” the period when the new writer was nurtured and
supported, without regard to the immediate costs? Are the only villains
the accountant-driven multi-national conglomerates controlling
publishing? Or are there problems with TV and movie-mimicking writers,
and writers of “faction” and memoir? What is the novelist to do? Are
there fewer good-book buying readers? Do publishers and agents gang
up against serious novelists?
Moderator: Morgan Entrekin
with: Ann Beattie, Philip Caputo, Alison Lurie
|
| 7:00 p.m. |
Writers' Workshops Orientation Dinner
Top of La Concha, 430 Duval Street
|
| Monday, January 11 thru Thursday, January 14 |
| |
See the Writers’ Workshops for schedules.
|
|
17th Annual Key West Literary Seminar
