The F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Festival will honor prolific award-winning author John Edgar Wideman, on Saturday, Oct. 30, with the 2021 F. Scott Fitzgerald Award for Outstanding Achievement in American Literature.
The award has been presented to some of America’s most distinguished writers, including Richard Russo, Annie Proulx, Norman Mailer, Pat Conroy, John Updike, Joyce Carol Oates and Amy Tan.
The festival’s 2021 keynote speaker will be Michael Dirda, a Pulitzer Prize-winning critic for “The Washington Post Book World.”
The F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Festival was established in 1996 to celebrate the centenary of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s birth and the city where Fitzgerald, his wife and daughter are buried — the festival is co-sponsored by the City of Rockville and the F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Conference, Inc. The festival is for writers, book lovers and Fitzgerald fans.
Major events for the 2021 festival will be held throughout September and October. This year’s festival events will be held virtually. See the website for details. For the most up-to-date information on the festival’s schedule, visit www.fscottfestival.org/schedule.
- From 7-8:30 p.m. Friday, Sept. 17, D. Quentin Miller will lead a discussion of “Brothers & Keepers,” Wideman’s memoir.
- At 6-8 p.m. Friday, Sept. 24, Fitzgerald’s 125th birthday, the festival will present a showing of “Gatsby in Connecticut,” a documentary about Fitzgerald’s time in Westport, Connecticut, and how it influenced the writing of “The Great Gatsby,” followed by a discussion with the film’s producer Robert Williams, and Fitzgerald scholar and documentary participant Walter Raubicheck.
- The festival will recognize winners of the annual F. Scott Fitzgerald short story contest for students and adults, Thursday, Oct. 21.
- At 7 p.m. Friday, Oct. 29, the festival and The Writer’s Center in Bethesda will present “Readings in Tribute to John Edgar Wideman.”
- The conference’s main day, Saturday, Oct. 30, will include morning and afternoon writing workshops designed for both emerging and established fiction and nonfiction writers; a master class about writing with Wideman; and the awards ceremony, featuring a reading by Wideman.
For more information, and to register, visit www.fscottfestival.org or call 301-309-9461.