Susie Anderson
Staff writer
Each summer season, Chautauqua welcomes in a host of writers from every corner of the world for the Chautauqua Lecture Series, Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle presentations and its Writers’ Center faculty. However, it does not take much searching to discover that published writers abound among Chautauqua’s very own community members.
At 12:15 p.m. today on the porch of the Literary Arts Center at Alumni Hall, local authors Fred Zirm, Chris Flanders, John Brantingham and Karen J. Weyant will read from their work and discuss craft for a Brick Walk Book Talk for Chautauqua Literary Arts’ Summer on the Steps programming.
The event promises a mixture of genre for all readers and writers. Zirm is a poet and playwright, Flanders writes historical fiction, Brantingham writes microfiction and prose and Weyant writes poetry.
When they’re not writing, these Chautauqua authors are giving back to their community. Zirm, president of Friends of the Writers’ Center, recently organized the Jules Feiffer play reading in collaboration with Friends of Chautauqua Theater. Brantingham organizes informal critiques every Friday through the Friends of the Writers’ Center. Weyant contributes to Authors’ Hour and Chris Flanders is a CLSC graduate and member of the Guild of Seven Seals.
“(Flanders) just happened to have published her most recent historical fiction novel and reached out when I happened to be looking for people, and I was like, ‘Perfect! I have something for you if you’re going to be here,’ ” said Stephine Hunt, managing director of literary arts.
Hunt said the program emerged as a collaboration between the literary arts department and Friends of the Chautauqua Writers’ Center.
“The Friends of Chautauqua Writers’ Center have been making sure our Chautauquan and local authors have voices in the Authors’ Hour events on Tuesdays and in their Authors Among Us Book Fair that happened earlier in the summer,” she said. “But there’s only so many spaces that can be filled in those events.”
In collaboration with Zirm, Hunt prioritized giving local authors a platform without overlapping with participants from Friends of the Writers’ Center Authors’ Hour Readings.
“I wanted to make sure we had a number of diverse voices and people we hadn’t heard from … in Authors’ Hour or at other points during the summer,” Hunt said.
The name for the program emerged from a 2019 event titled Brick Walk Book Walk, involving stickers on the Brick Walk that pointed Chautauquans in the direction of literary programming.
“You can go here to meet a bunch of authors on Bestor Plaza, you can go here to the Poetry Makerspace, you can go here to the CLSC Octagon … it was a big weekend celebrating our local and Chautauqua authors, featuring all of the literary arts locations,” Hunt said.
While today’s Brick Walk Book Talk will not cover as much physical ground as the Book Walk, Hunt said that the event will celebrate the work of local authors and the work of Friends of the Writers’ Center.
“Let’s feature some of our local and Chautauqua authors and collaborate with programs that we know are doing that work already,” Hunt said.
