New York Times bestselling novelist Silas House will be keynote speaker at the second annual James Agee Conference for Literature and Arts Oct. 6-7 at Pellissippi State Community College.
The conference, which will be at the Hardin Valley Campus, 10915 Hardin Valley Road, is free and open to the public. The event brings together top writers, artists and scholars from across the region to celebrate the work and influence of Knoxville native James Agee.
Noted Appalachian authors Taylor Brown, Erick Reece and Darnell Arnoult will also speak. Workshops will include a fiction master class by Brown, a nonfiction master class by Reece, and a master class on poetry by Arnoult. A full schedule is available at www.pstcc.edu/ageeconference.
House, a noted environmental activist who often speaks out about mountaintop removals, is the author of bestselling novel “Clay’s Quilt.” His other novels include “A Parchment of Leaves,” a Chaffin Award for Literature winner; and “The Coal Tattoo,” which won the Appalachian Writers’ Association Book of the Year and Kentucky Novel of the Year awards.
Novelist Silas House will be keynote speaker at the second annual James Agee Conference. Photo via Facebook
Brown wrote the novels, “Fallen Land,” a 2017 Southern Book Prize finalist, and “The River of Kings.” Reece wrote the nonfiction books, “Lost Mountain: A Year in the Vanishing Wilderness: Radical Strip Mining and the Devastation of Appalachia” and “An American Gospel: On Family, History and The Kingdom of God.” Arnoult, author of the books, “Galaxie Wagon: Poems” and “What Travels With Us: Poems,” is a Weatherford Award winner and previous Tennessee Writer of the Year.
To request accommodations for a disability at this event, call 865-539-7401 or email accommodations@pstcc.edu. Charles Dodd White, associate professor of English, is event coordinator.