Celebrating 50 Years of the Writers' Festival

Over the years, Agnes Scott College has showcased distinguished writers and nurtured new ones.

By Sara Baxter

The annual Writers’ Festival author talks consistently draw a significant number of attendees, including Agnes Scott College students. Photo from 2014 Writers’ Festival.

When prize-winning playwright Jacqueline Goldfinger ’00 was a student at Agnes Scott College, her favorite time of year was the annual Writers’ Festival. She met writers like Jane Smiley, Pearl Cleage, Jamaica Kincaid, Eavan Boland and Joyce Carol Oates. She read their works, listened to their stories and chatted with them in person. And for the first time, she could see herself as a writer.

“I loved to write and had been writing short stories and plays throughout my childhood,” Goldfinger says. “But I never knew it could be a profession. Seeing those writers, and talking to them, gave me the confidence to say to myself, ‘You can do this,’ and to go out there and try,” she says.

For 50 years, distinguished poets, short story authors, novelists, playwrights and creative nonfiction writers have been a part of the Agnes Scott Writers’ Festival. They have impacted and inspired hundreds of students just like Goldfinger.

“It’s been a treat to see the legacy and the importance the festival and the writers have had on the students in the writing community,” says Nicole Stamant, associate professor of English, who oversaw this year’s festival.

“The Writers’ Festival is attached to the overall profile and reputation of the college as a place where writing is nurtured, respected and promoted,” adds Willie Tolliver, professor of English.

Before the festival began, Agnes Scott already had a long tradition of bringing significant writers and cultural figures to its campus. Poet Robert Frost spent a week at the college every year from 1945 to 1962. Flannery O’Connor and W.H. Auden also were visitors. Building on that reputation, the college’s English department, spearheaded by Bo Ball, the late emeritus professor of English at Agnes Scott, created the Writers’ Festival. “They had a strong feeling that students should be exposed to writers on a regular basis, and they recognized that students could learn from other writers,” says Christine Cozzens, vice president for academic affairs, dean of the college and Charles A. Dana Professor of English, who has been teaching at Agnes Scott since 1987. “They felt that the presence of published writers would be very powerful.”

In organizing the festival, Ball also established a statewide writing contest in which college students, from undergraduates to doctoral students, could submit fiction and poetry. That contest is still going strong today and was expanded in the 1990s to include dramatic writing and nonfiction essays to reflect the four genres taught at the college. An independent panel of judges chooses the finalists, and the festival guest writers select the winners in each category. Finalists’ submissions are featured in a festival magazine that is edited and produced by students during a semester-long course.

“The contest is a brilliant way to look at what young writers across the state are doing,” says Stamant.

Although the contest is open to all Georgia college students, Agnes Scott students are regularly on the winner’s list.

“It was such an incredible opportunity,” says Kristin Hall ’06, who won the playwriting category three years in a row. “I love being able to list ‘published playwright’ on my theatrical resume thanks to the Writers’ Festival.”

May Sarton, Michael Mott and Marion Montgomery were the invited writers at the first festival. For the next five decades, the Agnes Scott Writers’ Festival earned a solid reputation for attracting distinguished writers, such as Robert Penn Warren, Eudora Welty, Alfred Uhry, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Junot Díaz, John Updike and Joy Harjo, to name a few. As the festival evolved, the organizers added a writer-in-residence program about 10 years ago, in which a featured writer spends a week at the college and teaches a one-hour credit class. Nonfiction writer Scott Russell Sanders was the first writer-in-residence in 2010.

Led by the chair, the English department plans the festival, chooses the writers, coordinates the events and oversees the student writing contest. The college’s senior director of special events helps with all the logistics.

When deciding whom to invite, the department looks for writers whose work will resonate with the students, who come from a wide range of cultures and backgrounds and who will impact the students the most. And when writers arrive, they will be in front of a thoughtful, informed and prepared audience. Most first-year English classes read the authors’ works during spring semester; they come to the Q&A sessions prepared to engage with the writers.

“We choose people who are not only great writers, but also those who enjoy interacting with the students,” says Alan Grostephan, associate professor of English. “The writers are happy to be there, and they can sense the passion of the student body. Students come with a wealth of knowledge, and writers can sense when students are informed.”

“The excitement that our students have when they meet these writers is wonderful to watch,” adds Cozzens. “They have wonderful questions both about the work and the writing life. It’s a life changing experience for some of them.”

While alum writers were included starting as early as 1976, in 2005, the college made a concerted effort to make sure there was one alum at the festival each year.

“The number of published, well-known writers who have graduated from the school is impressive,” says Tolliver. “Having them return inspires the students.”

Goldfinger became one of them, taking part in the Writers’ Festival as a featured writer in 2012, 2018 and again this year as a writer-in-residence for the festival’s 50th year. It was something that as a student at the college, she never would have imagined.

“The first time I was invited was amazing,” she remembers. “My mind was blown to realize I was one of the people that students would want to talk to. It’s thrilling, terrifying and very satisfying to know you’re helping the next generation of writers move forward and evolve. And I loved the idea that I could give back to a community that has given so much to me.”

Since writers spend at least two days on campus and participate in different events beyond just a reading, the Writers’ Festival becomes a real educational opportunity.

“Students learn so much from the writers,” Grostephan says. “They hear the ups and downs and frustrations of being a writer. It reinforces what we are trying to do in the classroom in terms of ideas and strategies for writing, but they are hearing it from a different voice. Students feel affirmed as it validates what they are doing is important.”

Anna Cabe ’13, who won the writing contest in the nonfiction category in 2012 and has published many stories, poems and essays since then, agrees. “I credit the vibrancy of the creative writing community at Agnes Scott for pushing my writing further,” she says. “I was excited to meet writers who’ve published books and won awards like Cristina García, Danzy Senna and Gish Jen. Having them read and take my work seriously meant so much to me at the time, and that care and attention still matters.”

As the Agnes Scott community benefits from the annual festival, so does the greater Atlanta community, as the festival is open to the public at no charge.

“We work to create an environment that is inclusive where people from all walks of life can come together to share their passion about topics around the guest writers’ works,” says Demetrice Williams, senior director of special events and community relations, who has been instrumental in planning the festival for the past 22 years. “Their passion is fueled by hearing the writers read their work and sparks discussions that sometimes go very late. It’s very exciting to be a spectator in this space.”

1973 Writers’ Festival guest writer Robert Penn Warren (left) and former Writers’ Festival Director and the late Emerita Professor of English Margaret W. Pepperdene

1997 Writers’ Festival guest writer Pearl Cleage

2000 Writers’ Festival guest writer Joyce Carol Oates 2001

2000 Writers’ Festival guest writer Joyce Carol Oates 2001 Writers’ Festival guest writers Marsha Norman ’69x, H ’05 (center) and John Updike (right)

2003 Writers’ Festival guest writer Julia Alvarez

From left to right: 2012 Writers’ Festival guest writers Jacqueline Goldfinger ’00 (also a 2021 guest writer), Benjamin Percy and Joy Harjo

Photo courtesy of Professor Emeritus of English Jim Diedrick

From left to right: 2014 Writers’ Festival guest writers Nick Flynn, Louisa Hill ’09 and Terrance Hayes.

Photo courtesy of Professor Emeritus of English Jim Diedrick

2021 and 1992 Writers’ Festival guest writer Rita Dove

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the 50th Annual Writers’ Festival was held virtually this year. Along with Goldfinger, Pulitzer Prize winning poet and U.S. Poet Laureate Rita Dove (who also came in 1992) was a featured writer. The two writers participated in the traditional Q&A and gave readings via Zoom. Other highlights in celebration of the anniversary included viewing archival footage of past authors, additional readings and the Georgia premiere of Goldfinger’s play “The Arsonists,” which was performed on stage at the Dana Fine Arts Building and streamed three nights for viewers to see.

The English department is already hard at work planning next year’s festival. They will once again invite important writers who will continue nurture and inspire future writers.

“The Writers’ Festival was always a highlight of my time at Agnes Scott,” says Cheryl Reid ’95, who recently published her first novel and won the festival’s writing contest in the fiction category in 1998 when she was an MFA student at Georgia State University. “I remember going back to my dorm after a reading, feeling inspired by the guests and the community of readers and writers. As a student, the festival gave proof that becoming a writer was a possibility.”