A celebration of poetry and fiction, the festival features sessions with local professors, published poets and award winning writers. The schedule for the writers' festival includes:
Thursday, April 1
9:30-10:45 am - Poetry readings by Tony Medina and Terry Wallace. Medina, of Harlem, is a published and award winning poet and fiction author and is currently a writer-in-residence at Howard University. Wallace, a senior professor of English at HACC, is a nationally published poet and is presently completing a series of poems about Francis of Assisi.
11:00am-12:15pm --William Keckler and Marybeth Rua-Larsen. Keckler's poetry, prose and verbo-visual art have appeared in several hundred magazines around the world since 1990. Rua-Larsen is a published poet and teacher and has participated in the Feminist Women Writers Workshop in upstate New York.
12:30pm - 1:45pm - Christopher Couch and Mary Hoffman. Couch, of Messiah College, will read and discuss his works. Hoffman is a published poet and has won South Carolina's prize for short fiction.
2pm - 3:15pm - Paco de Nada and Matt Roth. de Nada is an accomplished Flamenco guitarist, poet, painter and a teacher from Harrisburg. He is one of the co-founders of the group Danzante, and is the principal guitarist for Cocina Flamenca, Danzon, and Zambra Flamenca.
Friday, April 2
9am - 9:50am - Lamont Steptoe, award-winning poet from Pittsburgh. He is the author of nine books and a 1996 recipient of a Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Fellowship in poetry.
10am - 10:50am - Deborah Larsen, of Gettysburg, has had her poems and short stories appear in The New Yorker, The Nation, The Yale Review, The Quarterly and Oxford Magazine.
11am - 11:50am - Tony Medina is currently writer-in-residence at Howard University in Washington D.C. His children's books have garnered several awards, including the Parent's Guide Children's Media Award in 2001, and the Paterson Prize for Books for Young People in 2002.
Noon - 12:50pm - Mark Shulman writes for children and adults, publishing an assortment of more than 30 books.
Following Shulman's presentation is a panel discussion. Panel members are:
Donna Wierzbowski, is self-employed providing writing, editing, desktop publishing, and photography services to area clients and Philadelphia businesses.
Terry Wallace and Mary Hoffman, both presenters on April 1 during the festival, join the panel.
Rick Kearns, poet, journalist, musician and teacher from Harrisburg.
To register or for more information about this free event, contact Geri Gutwein, associate professor of English, (717) 780-2433, or email Gutwein at the address below.