LANGSTON HUGHES STAGE
WORDS LIKE FREEDOOM
There are words like Freedom
Sweet and wonderful to say.
On my heart-strings freedom sings
All day everyday.
There are words like Liberty
That almost make me cry.
If you had known what I knew
You would know why.
REFUGEE IN AMERICA
by Langston Hughes
SCHOMBURG CENTER LITERARY FESTIVAL SCHEDULE
**More to come! Check back for updates.**
PRE-FESTIVAL EVENT!
Dear Senthuran: A Black Spiritual Memoir
June 8 | 7:00 PM (ET)
Presented in Partnership with NYPL LIVE
The bestselling author shares their debut work of nonfiction, Dear Senthuran, a memoir that "deeply engages with the metaphysics of Black spirit and singularly faces the Black reader." Akwaeke Emezi speaks with Saidiya Hartman about their revelatory account of storytelling, self, and survival.
MONDAY
June 14 | 6:30 PM (ET)
Land of the Free
Natalie Baszile’s debut novel, Queen Sugar, and her latest anthology, We Are Each Other's Harvest, elevate the voices and stories of black farmers. She joins us in examining Black people’s connection to the American land from Emancipation to today.
Featuring Natalie Baszile
TUESDAY
June 15 | 6:30 PM (ET)
Two Freedoms: Speech and Guns
Carol Anderson author of The Second: Race and Guns in a Fatally Unequal America and Ellis Cose, author of The Short Life and Curious Death of Free Speech in America take us through our fraught history with the first and second amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
Featuring Ellis Cose and Carol Anderson
WEDNESDAY
June 16 | 6:30 PM (ET)
Freedom to Publish
As news outlets laud a new Black renaissance in the visual and literary arts, Dr. Haki Madhubuti, founder and Publisher of Third World Press and Chris Jackson, Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of One World, discuss the challenges and freedoms that come with choosing what gets published and subverting dominant narratives.
Featuring Dr. Haki Madhubuti and Chris Jackson
THURSDAY
June 17 | MULTIPLE PROGRAMS | 1:00 - 7:00 PM (ET)
No Small Voice
Join us for a half-day of readings, panel discussions, and more for young people, featuring prose and poetry, comic books and storybooks.
1:00 (ET)
Jupiter Invincible
By Yusef Komunyakaa, illustrated by Ashley A. Wood, and Ram Devineni, AR Creator
2:30 (ET)
Born Ready: The True Story of a Boy Named Penelope
By Jodie Patterson
The ABCs of Black History
By Rio Cortez
SATURDAY
June 19 | 10:30 AM - 5:30 PM (ET)
Words Like Freedom
We are celebrating Juneteenth with an incredible line up of authors from across the globe, including Farah Jasmine Griffin, Ben Okri, Desmond Meade, and Yaba Blay, whose works of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry celebrate and interrogate the sweet refrain of freedom’s song in our everyday lives.
June 19 | 10:30 (ET)
JUNETEENTH OPENING PROGRAM
TWO VIRTUAL STAGES | TEN PROGRAMS
June 19 | 11:00 AM (ET)
Read Until You Understand
By Farah Jasmine Griffin
Moderated by Tressie McMillan Cottom
SATURDAY
June 19 | 12:00 PM (ET)
HOW THE WORD IS PASSED:
A Reckoning With the History of Slavery Across America
By Clint Smith
SATURDAY
SATURDAY
June 19 | 1:15 PM (ET)
The Age of Phillis and
The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois
By Honorée Fanonne Jeffers
SATURDAY
June 19 | 2:00 PM (ET)
Long Division
By Kiese Laymon
Let My People Vote: Battle to Restore the Civil Rights of Returning Citizens
By Desmond Meade
Moderated by Reginald Dwayne Betts
SATURDAY
SATURDAY
June 19 | 3:00 PM (ET)
A Girl is a Body of Water / The First Woman
By Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi
SATURDAY
June 19 | 3:15 PM (ET)
Voices from Harlem
presented by
Harlem Writers Guild
Featuring John Robinson, Marc polite, Angela Dews, Malik Kirkwood, Eartha W. Hicks, Robert Woodbine, Kay Bell, Judy Andrews, and Minnette Coleman
SATURDAY
June 19 | 4:30 PM (ET)
A Little Devil in America:
Notes in Praise of Black Performance
By Hanif Abdurraqib
Moderated by Dawnie Walton