Speaker History

Check out the upcoming speakers page for more information.

Erika Meitner
Sarah Hepola
Mandana Zandian & Amir Ahmadi Arian
Russell Cobb 

Saeed Jones
Mira Jacob
Sarah Smarsh

*Reduced programming due to the COVID-19 pandemic

Dwayne Betts & Natalie Diaz

*Much of programming on hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic

Brian Van Reet, novelist
Ada Limón, poet
David Wallace-Wells, journalist
Sam Lebovic, historian

Leni Zumas, author of the novel, Red Clocks, & Farewell Navigator: Stories
Paul Lisicky, poet and memoirist, author of the memoir, The Narrow Door
Jennifer Change & Hank Rossouw, poets
Mary-Rose Papandrea, legal scholar
Norman Doidge, neuroscientist and author
Andrea Lawlor, author of the novel, Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl
Bahman Maghsoudlou, documentary filmmaker
Jericho Brown, poet and writer of poetry anthology The Tradition
Paul La Farge, novelist
Lance Olsen, novelist
Paul Woodruff, philosopher

Amy Gajda, author of The First Amendment Bubble: How Privacy and Paparazzi Threaten a Free Press
Richard Fish, author of The Blind Musician
Sam Sax, poet, Madness
Fiona McFarlane, author of The Night Guest
Natalie Diaz, author of When My Brother Was an Aztec
Tarfia Faizullah, poet, Seam
Antonio Ruiz Camacho, journalist and fiction writer
Kareem Abdulrahman, translator and Kurdish affairs analyst
Brent Iverson, Dean of School of Undergraduate Studies
Sarah Manguso, writer and poet
Jeff VanderMeer, author, editor, and literary critic
Mary Jo Bang
Adria Frizzi
Wayne A. Rebhorn
Valeria Luiselli, author

Erin Thompson, writer
Kazim Ali, poet, essayist, and fiction writer
Dorit Rabinyan, novelist and screenwriter
Brenda Shaughnessy
Jim Magnuson
Carrie Fountain
Hannah Wojciehowski
Paul Woodruff, philosopher
Lee Walker
John Weinstock
Kurt Heinzelman

Noelle Kolcot, poet
Max Porter, novelist 
Nadine Strossen, constitutional scholar 
Eula Biss, essayist   
Michael Gray
Dinaw Mengestu, novelist
Suzanne Reddy
Craig Hurwitz, physician and director of children’s shakespeare program
Margaret Wardlaw, essayist and physician
Sayed Kashua
Lucy Corin
Nina McConigley
Will Potter
Matthew Rohrer
Amy Gentry, novelist
Heather Christle & Chris DeWeese, poets
Mat Johnson, novelist
Elizabeth Crook, novelist
Dominic Smith, novelist
Karen Olsson, novelist

Ana Marie Cox

Luis Alberto Urrea, author
Eduardo C. Corral
Lisa Solomon
Mary Jo Bang
Caleb Crain
Anne Hull

Karen Russell, novelist
Louie Palu, photographer
Andrea Gibson, poet
Evan Smith, editor of Texas Tribune
Larry Towell, photographer
Sarah Wilson, photographer
Anis Mojgani, poet
Alexis Levitin
Salgado Maranhao, poet
Adélia Prado, poet
Ellen Doré Watson, poet and translator
Allesandra Sanguinetti, photographer

Chang-Rae Lee, novelist
Anthony Doerr, author
Dona Schwartz, Julie Blackmon & Cori Pepelnjak, photographers
Part Parker & Rita DeWitt, creative collaborators
Mickey Edwards, author and politician

Sam Tanehause, editor of the New York Times Book Review
Stuart Schoffman, former Anti-Defamation League fellow in Jerusalem
Buzz Bissinger, author of Friday Night Lights
Paul Lisicky, novelist, memoirist, and poet
Stephen Scobie, poet
Robert Schenkkan, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, author
Russell Banks, author

Philip Gourevitch, author
Salvador Plascencia, novelist
Adam Gopnik, author

Elva Treviño Hart, author of memoir Barefoot Heart: Stories of a Migrant Child
Alison Bechdel, author of the graphic novel Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic
Patricia Smith, poet
Mark Richard, author
Anne Fadiman, author
John Taggart
Tobias Wolff

Scott McCloud, comic book author
Dominic Smith, novelist
Jason Schneiderman, poet
Yvette Christianse, novelist and poet
Stuart Schoffman, journalist
Colum McCann, author
Tony D'Souza, aovelist
C.K. Williams, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet
Anne Waldman, poet

Howard Norman, author
Alice Notley, poet
Corinne Lee & Hoa Nguyen, poets
Barry Lopez, author
Mary Karr, author
Barbara Ras, poet
Lawrence Wright, journalist
James H. Jones, biographer
Aminatta Forna, author and journalist
Stanley Crawford, novelist
Jason Schneiderman, poet
Mary Karr, memoirist
Barry Lopez, author