Went down to The Mall this afternoon to check out the National Book Festival. It's been going on for 10 years now, but I'd never taken the time to go before.
The view at the top of the Metro stop is that of a circus. Tents up and down The Mall with banners declaring their genre or target audience or affiliation.
Author Maria Dueñas ("
The Seamstress" & "
The Time in Between") interacting with members of the audience in the
Fiction and Mystery tent.
A middle school student shares a book review in the
Pavilion of the States.
But the goal and gem of my visit: Nikky Finney.
Nikky is a professor of writing at the University of Kentucky and the winner of the National Book award in 2011 for her collection of poems, "
Head Off & Split." She was amazing and warm and insightful and above all generous. It wasn't long before I found my heart inexplicably stuck in my throat and there was no way to push it back down into my chest.
To thank the audience for their presence with her, she finished with this quote: "Absolutely unmixed attention is prayer." ~ Simone Weil
Standing ovation and gesture of appreciation to her sign language translator.
On to other sights, e-books! and the DIGITALBookmobile.
The
Teens and Children's tent was a bit deceptively titled as it was really a vendors paradise!
From a Wells Fargo photo opt, to....
....a Lego promotional.
Complete with a Lego sculpture!
The
PBS tent offered a very popular loggia of photo opts, too.
As best I could tell, these are The Okee Dokee Brothers performing at the
Family Storytelling Stage.
Last stop, the Barnes & Noble tent to get a copy of Nikky's book.
Then a once around the author's signature tents! At a glance, I figured 2,000 people. Nikky wasn't scheduled to do signings for another hour and fifteen minutes and her line had already begun to form. I wanted to get a signature, but decided to opt for a letter of appreciation.
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