- The Easton Book Festival is running from Oct. 19-22
- Events include author meet-and-greets, readings, children's puppet shows and more
- Local authors are encouraged to attend and participate in the festivities
EASTON, Pa. — A celebration of the written word and all that it brings into life returns to the Lehigh Valley this week with the Easton Book Festival.
Running from Oct. 19 through Oct. 22, the festival serves not only to honor the incredible power of storytelling but also to commemorate the immense talent to be found throughout the city of Easton.
From Poetry on the Square to panel discussions with independent scholars to discussions on romance and beyond, the festival has something for just about everyone.
As Festival Board President Christopher N. Phillips puts it, “When we celebrate books, we celebrate the joy of reading. We celebrate the power of literacy. We celebrate the power of imagination and research the hard work of sharing words with the world.
“At a time when the stories and dreams we share are more important for the life of our community than ever, I am thrilled that Easton is a home for this rich array of programs, including so many wonderful local authors, readers and other book people,” Phillips states on the Easton Book Festival website.
Phillips heralds the occasion as “a great blend of performing and visual arts alongside the written word,” and “truly a community event, with many local organizations contributing programming and talent as well as their inviting spaces for presenters local, regional and national.”
“This is our fifth Easton Book Festival, and we have a community development mission. We're not a book festival that relies on bringing in authors who have new books that they've been on tour for – we're a festival that celebrates the creativity and the literary work of the community,” Andy Laties, co-founder and director of the festival and co-owner of Book and Puppet Company, said.
“We do have some authors who come from outside the area, but mostly, we're celebrating authors and illustrators who live in the area. And we have panel discussions, where we talk about important topics of the day, which may be moderated by community leaders or professors from Lafayette College.”
Interested in the sultry world of romance and erotica? Juicy Bits: Easton Book Festival After Dark with Parisian Phoenix Press can help with the “hows and whys of putting sex into print.”
Perhaps you would like to meet some local Lehigh Valley writers and engage in some conversation on the craft, in which case, the Greater Lehigh Valley Writers Group Author Tables Meet and Greet is right up your alley.
For an engaging perspective on life as a young Black woman growing up in the South, make sure to check out Looking Toward the Rising Sun, an author reading presented by Lizzie Ellison, who came of age just as the new Civil Rights movement began to take shape.
If you would like to dip your toes into the ‘zine scene, there’s the Easton Zine [Mini] Library Zine Swap – just make sure to bring your own publication to trade!
And don’t forget the wealth of children’s programming, including Echo City Capers Storytime with Artmaking, Stick Figure Poetry Showcase and a Drag Queen Story Hour with the Yippee Skippy Puppets (check out our bonus preview for a deep dive into this one!).
"It's very important for us to reach the children, and the way that we make sure that happens is we don't just run public programs; we also have run an author tour in the schools"Andy Laties, co-founder and director of Easton Book Festival
“It's very important for us to reach the children, and the way that we make sure that happens is we don't just run public programs; we also have run an author tour in the schools,” Laties said.
“For instance, in terms of local authors, Robin Riding is the pen name of my wife, Rebecca Migdal, who is the co-owner of Book and Puppet Company, and she had a children's book published by Macmillan a few years ago called ‘Mermaids Fast Asleep,’ and we've been touring the schools on and off over the last four years. But just this week, we did three shows at Tracy Elementary School. So she's a local author, and she's written a picture book, and so we bought paper puppets for the children to color. We've now distributed 600 of these paper puppets into the schools and the children have colored them and cut them out. And then during her program, she's a puppeteer.”
Laties said such events are very engaging for the younger students, who are excited to meet an author. The event can be truly inspiring, too, showing children that if you really want to, you can do anything you set your mind to – including writing your very own book.
“The authors represent a possible future,” Laties said. “If you can draw a picture, you can make a story. And that is exactly what the children are doing in the schools. They should be encouraged to draw and encouraged to write, and that's what they're focusing on. That's what they're learning. When the author visits and they made that book, that's the kind of thing that really excites the children.”
And that sense of inspiration carries on to the adults as well, Laties said. As the festival doesn’t charge a table fee for participants, it’s a rather inclusive event that encourages anyone to step up and join in on the creativity and fun.
It’s all in the name of making the art of literature accessible to everyone, showing that all it takes is a sense of drive and creativity.
“We're encouraging people to think about books as something that's created by us – we make the books – that there's not this kind of distance between those who are professionals and experts. And it is quite a striking thing to see that so many people think about the book that they would like to write or the book that they have written, and then take this opportunity to kind of come forward and say ‘Well, I I wrote a book,’” Laties said.
Find the full list of activities, both online and in-person, here.
