I will be reading this Sunday, May 22nd, 2016 at the Oakland Book Festival.
Hearing Room 4: 4:30—6:00pm
“East Bay Poetics: Love and Duty” featuring:
Elmaz Abinader, Sharon Coleman, Sharon Doubiago, Claire Ortalda, Floyd Salas, Al Young, Tony R. Rodriguez
We participated last year and it was an absolutely great festival. When not engaged in reading my poetry, I will probably be hanging around the PEN Oakland booth. Hope to see you there.
Festival Information
http://www.oaklandbookfestival.org/
The festival opens at 10:30. Free.
Oakland City Hall, 1 Frank H. Ogawa Plaza (14th and Broadway)
The Oakland Book Festival is a one-day, annual literary event. Dedicated to books, ideas, and the pleasures of literacy, it aims to serve the reading public, to encourage debate, and to celebrate the City of Oakland. It will host more than sixty writers in 2016 and is free and open to the public.
The Festival will be held at Oakland’s City Hall. Hearing rooms will be transformed into meeting halls in which journalists, fiction writers, historians, poets, editors, critics, and memoirists will convene on panels to discuss the challenges of gentrification, cosmopolitanism, diversity, tolerance, conflict, education, surveillance and security, labor, libraries, archives, magazine publishing, imprisonment, civil disobedience, whistle-blowing, prayer, food production and consumption, activism, and the future. Panels are moderated by experts and are oriented toward encouraging conversation with the audience. More than a literary trade show or a series of readings, the Festival asks authors to discuss ideas, to bring their expertise to bear, to share their experience: to challenge, elevate, and inspire one another and those in attendance.
In front of City Hall, on Frank Ogawa Plaza, there will be live performances for all ages as well as a dedicated children’s area that will feature readings hosted by the Oakland Public Library, book-making projects sponsored by Oakland’s Museum of Children’s Art (MOCHA), and interactive programs courtesy of Fairyland. Book vendors and publishers will have tables with merchandise for sale; food trucks will be parked on adjacent streets to provide nourishment.
Clay Street Garage (1414 Clay St, Oakland) is open and available the day of the Festival for a flat fee of $5 for the day.
You can also reach City Hall by the 12th Street/City Center BART station and AC Transit lines at the 14th Street/ Broadway stops.