Fall for the Book returns Sept. 27-Oct. 3 with a slate of impressive authors.
By Cameron Mellin
Courtesy of houghton mifflin harcourt (‘The Things They Carried’); Courtesy of Random House (‘The Paris Wife’ and ‘outlander’)courtesy of Jen Brooks (‘In a World Just Right’); Courtesy of New Leaf Literary & Media, Inc (‘The Witch Hunter’); Courtesy of Penguin Random House (‘A Lesson Before Dying’)
Back for its 16th season, George Mason University’s Fall for the Book is set to inspire another year’s worth of bookworms. A weeklong regional festival, FFTB brings writer and reader together via discussions with accomplished authors, literary workshops for the kids and dramatic interpretations of the source material, fueling the next generation of authors from nonfiction to poetry and everywhere in between.
The literary lineup is endless, but we have done the grunt work for you by narrowing down the festival’s must-see events certain to inspire your own novel (be it five or 10 years in the making, we won’t judge) or simply a curling up next to the fire with a good read and cup of chamomile as the weather cools.
Diana Gabaldon (Courtesy of Ellena Loughlin); Ernest J. Gaines (courtesy of Steven Forster); Dorianne Laux (Courtesy of John Campbell; Paula McLain (courtesy of Nina Subin); Tim O’Brien (courtesy of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt); Peter Straub (courtesy of Jerry Bauer); Jen Brooks (courtesy of Jen Brooks)
The Headliners
Sunday, Sept. 27
Kick off the festival with Diana Gabaldon, international best-selling author of the “Outlander” series beloved by teens and adults alike, who will be accepting the Mason Award, presented to an author whose work resonates with the wide-reaching public, at George Mason’s Center for the Arts.
Monday, Sept. 28
Sponsored by the Mason Reads program, a GMU initiative encouraging students to engage with one another through literature, MacArthur Genius Grant recipient Ernest J. Gaines will discuss his book “A Lesson before Dying.” A popular read amongst high school classrooms, Gaines’ novel explores themes of mortality, injustice and the confrontation of racism in the pre-civil rights South.
Friday, Oct. 2
Craft beer and creative arts haven Epicure Cafe hosts an evening of award-winning poetry. Poet Jeff Baker, the winner of the 2014 Idaho Prize for Poetry, and Dorianne Laux, whose most recent collection, “The Book of Men,” won the Paterson Prize, will both read. Poet Jeff Millar, described as “an authority of hard won experience” by the Prairie Schooner, will follow up with work from his collection “Blue Rust.”
Saturday, Oct. 3
Paula McLain, author of the New York Times best-seller “The Paris Wife,” the story of Ernest Hemingway and his wife Hadley in Jazz Age France, will read at GMU’s Harris Theater and discuss her latest work, “Circling the Sun.”
Saturday, Oct. 3
After McLain, stick around for the big finish when Tim O’Brien, Pulitzer Prize finalist and award-winning author of “The Things They Carried,” accepts the festival’s highest honor, The Fairfax Prize. O’Brien will discuss his experiences in Vietnam with NPR critic Alan Cheuse as well as his career as a novelist and literary philanthropist.
For the Kids
Wednesday, Sept. 30
Get the kids in the Halloween spirit with horror author Peter Straub, who has won a slew of Bram Stoker awards for superior achievement in scary storytelling. He will be reading from his collection of spooky stories at McLean’s Alden Theater at 7:30 p.m.
Saturday, Oct. 3
Young adult authors Jen Brooks, Virginia Boecker and Jean Marie Thorne will lead writing workshops in tandem with literary organization Freshman Fifteen for ages 12 and up. The writers will read from their tween-adored novels, giving kids one-on-one interaction with the authors and a chance to learn the ins and outs of becoming a writer.
q&a With tim o’brien
Tim O’Brien would wrap up studying around midnight, finished with his graduate coursework for the day—which at Harvard was anything but light—and close his textbook in the pursuit of a passion he had maintained from childhood.
“I’d write from somewhere around midnight to 4 a.m.,” says O’Brien. “You can’t be a dabbler to become a writer. You have to approach it the same way you would solving a Rubik’s cube: lots of practice … doing so every day,” no matter if it’s a late night in Cambridge or a year serving in the Vietnam War. The latter inspired O’Brien’s most famous work, “The Things They Carried,” which chronicles the lives of Alpha Company both during and after Vietnam. The work became a testament to the ideology and values of 20th-century America.
We sat down with O’Brien, recipient of this year’s Fairfax Prize presented by Fall for the Book, to talk about his award-winning work and the life that inspired it.
What do you think it is about ”The Things They Carried” that makes it so significant?
I think the readers tend to put themselves in the shoes of characters, whatever book they’re reading. They look at things from the perspective of their own experiences. A 19-year-old college student who may never be in war can understand what it means to be lonely and confused.
Would you say the work is a cross between fiction and your own experiences?
Everything a writer ever writes about is truth. Something brings you to write what you are writing. My motives for writing “The Things They Carried” are not limited to war. I was a soldier for a year of my life; I’m not really interested in bullets, bombs and military tactics. I never have been, but I am interested in how the human heart responds to terror and confusion. I was trying to answer the questions of “Why am I here? How will I keep my sanity? Will I ever cease with the bitterness and cynicism that war is accompanied with?” That’s what I tried to explore with the novel, in both the characters and myself.
When did you know you were going to make a career of being an author?
The daydream of wanting to be a writer collided with Vietnam, and I had to write. It wasn’t a question of wanting to … in a way you could say that no matter what story you are working on, it is a kind of therapy. For me it’s a lot more than that. It has to do with trying to make a beautiful piece of art out of life experience. Life is chaotic, random and often incredibly mysterious. We’d don’t know why we do the things we do all the time, but in a novel you can shape and try to understand as you’re writing what you can’t when you are living your life.
So what’s your endgame for your writing?
The object of my writing is to make a beautiful, harmonious piece of art, one that moves people’s emotions and focuses them in a fierce kind of way to help us all heal, and to translate those 26 letters we as writers have to work with to the reader so they can understand the world of not only the novel but the person behind it.
O’Brien will be accepting the Fairfax Prize October 3.
(September 2015)