12,000 READERS ENGAGED
From Literary Arts’ 2021/22 Annual Report
From the concert hall to the classroom, world-renowned authors engaged with our communities both virtually and in person. Our season of events featured more than 150 authors in lectures, readings, and discussions. We were overjoyed to safely welcome audiences back to in-person events, and offered hybrid options for Portland Arts & Lectures and Portland Book Festival.
Portland Arts & Lectures
The season began in October 2021 with a live remote presentation and ended in May 2022 with thousands of subscribers together in the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall. We offered the full season of lectures in a hybrid format, giving subscribers the option to attend in person or view from home. In addition to their lectures, our featured authors engaged with readers and writers of all ages in discussions with professional writers and meetings with public high school students.
Click here for the 2022/23 season lineup.
The Archive Project
Our radio show and podcast The Archive Project broadcasts a wide range of Literary Arts programming, including recordings from Portland Arts & Lectures, Portland Book Festival, Everybody Reads, special events, and Verselandia! In our eighth season, we also featured exclusive discussions, including a series of episodes with Oregon Shakespeare Festival, a discussion of Chinese cookbooks and the history of Chinatowns in America, and a conversation between writers with connections to Bosnia.
Everybody Reads 2022
In partnership with Multnomah County Library and The Library Foundation, this year’s Everybody Reads program featured Mira Jacob and her graphic memoir Good Talk. During her time in Portland, Jacob met with students at Lincoln and Reynolds High Schools.
“I was overjoyed to speak at the outstanding Everybody Reads program, where Literary Arts invited me to talk to what felt like an entire city that had read my book Good Talk. Honestly, one of the most extraordinary experiences I’ve ever had. Thank you, Portland! It was so, so good to be there. “
— Mira Jacob, author of 2022 Everybody Reads selection Good Talk
Portland Book Festival
Portland Book Festival (PBF) 2021, presented by Bank of America, was a hybrid event. We hosted five days of virtual programming, broadcast live from Literary Arts and from our partner bookstores around town. On Saturday, November 13, we returned to the Portland Art Museum and Portland’5 for an in-person Festival day. PBF 2021 featured a mix of more than 100 writers, including Rita Dove, Omar El Akkad, Louise Erdrich, Lauren Groff, Ruth Ozeki, Kristen Radtke, Gary Shteyngart, Dao Strom, Brandon Taylor, and Willy Vlautin. The in-person Festival day featured food trucks, a book fair, and pop-up readings in the Portland Art Museum galleries.
Delve Readers Seminars
We continued to offer most of our Delves online, but in the spring of 2022, we held our first in-person Delve in over two years. Delve participants read and discussed literature by Brit Bennett, Edwidge Danticat, George Eliot, Herman Melville, Arthur Schopenhauer, and others.
Committed to Equity
- Portland Book Festival lineup featured more than 40% Black, Indigenous, and/or People of Color (BIPOC) presenters (authors, moderators, and pop-up authors)
- Free and reduced-price tickets were offered for all programs, including through Arts for All and the Multnomah County Library’s Discovery Pass program
- Portland Book Festival featured a bilingual storytime in partnership with Multnomah County Library
Read the full report below.
Click here for a PDF version of the report.
