Two sessions involving Vanderbilt-affiliated authors will be broadcast live on C-SPAN Sunday, Oct. 16, from the Southern Festival of Books: A Celebration of the Written Word.
The free festival runs Oct. 14-16 at Legislative Plaza and the downtown Nashville Public Library. Books about slavery, violence against women, and Nashville during the civil rights era will be among the sessions featuring authors from Vanderbilt.
“Integrating the Divided City: Nashville during the Civil Rights Movement” will take place from noon to 1 p.m. CDT Sunday, Oct. 16, and air live on C-SPAN 2, according to festival organizers. The session in Room 31 of Legislative Plaza (301 6th Ave. N.) will feature Vanderbilt alumnus Andrew Maraniss, author of the best-selling book about Vanderbilt basketball pioneer Perry Wallace Strong Inside: Perry Wallace and the Collision of Race and Sports in the South. Wallace was the first African American to play basketball in the Southeastern Conference. Ansley Erickson from Columbia University will join Maraniss for the conversation.
Immediately following on C-SPAN 2 will be a session featuring Kelly Oliver, W. Alton Jones Professor of Philosophy at Vanderbilt. Oliver will participate in a discussion of her book Hunting Girls: Sexual Violence from the Hunger Games to Campus Rape. This session will run from 1 to 2 p.m. CDT in Room 31 of Legislative Plaza and be moderated by Lynn M. Alexander, dean of the College of Humanities at the University of Tennessee-Martin.
Another highlight event at the festival will be Vanderbilt professors Volney Gay and Alice Randall discussing Gay’s new book about slavery at noon CDT Oct. 14 in Room 29 at Legislative Plaza.
Gay and Randall have both written about slavery — in Randall’s case, a reinterpretation of Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind, titled The Wind Done Gone, from the point of view of a slave. Gay’s new book, On the Pleasures of Owning Persons: The Hidden Face of American Slavery, attempts an understanding of the mindsets of supposedly “good” people who were also slave owners. That list includes founding fathers like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson.
“There are hundreds of masterful books about slaves and their progeny, their history and their religion,” Gay said. “But I found few about the owners.” Raised in the North, Gay was inspired by Abraham Lincoln’s insight that many people might have acted like Civil War-era Southerners if they lived in the same circumstances.
Other sessions
Tracy Barrett, senior lecturer in Italian, emerita, at 3:30 p.m. CDT Oct. 16 in Legislative Plaza, Room 29, will discuss “Nashville’s Literary Lights: New Middle Grade Novels” with William M. Akers.
Alumnus Anders Carlson-Wee, at 3:30 p.m. CDT Oct. 15 in Nashville Public Library Conference Room 3, will discuss The Floodgate Series: Volume 3 with Andrew McFadyen-Ketchum, F. Douglas Brown, Kai Carlson-Wee and Geffrey Davis.
Alumnus Bryn Chancellor, at 11:30 a.m. CDT Oct. 15 in Legislative Plaza, Room 29, will discuss “The Rural, the Urban and the Search for Home: Navigating Landscapes in Short Stories” with Laura Hendrix Ezell and Kathy Flann.
MFA student Tiana Clark, at 3 p.m. CDT Oct. 14 in Nashville Public Library Conference Room 3, will discuss “Listen to Me: Bold Poetic Voices” with Jordan Rice.
Kate Daniels, professor of English, at 10 a.m. CDT Oct. 15 will discuss “Hard Lines: Rough South Poetry” with William Wright, Amy Wright and Ed Madden in Legislative Plaza, Room 12. In addition, at noon CDT Oct. 15 in Nashville Public Library Conference Room 3, Daniels will discuss “Profiles: Tennessee Pulitzer Winners in Literature” with Adam Ross, Bobby Rogers and Ed Tarkington.
Alumnus Frye Gaillard, at 10 a.m. CDT Oct. 15 in Nashville Public Library Conference Room 3, will discuss “Young Heroes of the Civil War Era” with Anne E. Burg.
Odie Lindsey, senior lecturer in medicine, health and society, at 10 a.m. Oct.15 in the Commons Room of the downtown Nashville Public library, will discuss “Nashville’s Literary Lights: New Voices” with Ed Tarkington. Lindsey’s story collection is We Come to Our Senses.
Jason Miller, editor at the IRIS Center at Peabody, at noon Oct. 16 in Room 29 in Legislative Plaza, will discuss his book Red Dog: A Slim in Little Egypt Mystery.
Randall, writer-in-residence, at 2:30 p.m. CDT Oct. 14 in the Nashville Public Library Banner Room, will discuss with authors Rebecca Wells and C. Michael Curtis “Enduring Legacies: The Best of Pulitzer Fiction.”
Anderson Spickard Jr., professor of medicine, emeritus, at 1 p.m. CDT Oct. 14 in Nashville Public Library Conference Room 3, will speak about his book The Craving Brain: Science, Spirituality, and the Road to Recovery.
Christina Stoddard, managing editor of Journal of Risk and Uncertainty at Vanderbilt Law School, at 4:30 p.m. CDT Oct.15 in Nashville Public Library Conference Room 2, will discuss “Light in the Darkness: Three Poets” with John C. Mannone and Angie Macri.