Festival of Faith & Writing - kdc

Okay, I'm a bad blogger. I lost my NAYC / GC mojo & barely made it through my email last night before crawling into bed - then could barely make it out this morning. After only 1 day!
Yes it's walking all over this nice, but not beautiful, Calvin College campus, but still...

But the highlights have been very high indeed - hope to upload pix tonight from the (actually very nice & service-friendly) Comfort Inn (as the shuttles only take us home at the end of the day) - so here's a little bit here & there:

* Here's what I like about this conference - they're confident enough about their faith in Christ that they're unafraid to invite those who have different views on "faith." Thus I attended a session where a Christian & Muslim poet shared how they embed their faith into their works; Salman Rushdie, who has certainly been on the business end of faith & was already a declared atheist, will be speaking tonight because his books explore the distance between belief and non-belief; the boldest evangelical writer stands besides another whose only connection is 12 years of Catholic school. There's a diversity that enriches without threatening.

* Not that this diversity doesn't cause me some uncomfortable moments. Immediately before Andy Crouch's hour-long interview of the great (& that is the correct word for her writings - great) Marilynne Robinson, I plopped down beside a little English/Creative Writing Prof from Evangel College from Springfield, MO. Hey, I'm from MO, too! Let's talk! Soon enough we discovered we were both Pentecostal. She was Assembly of God. I wasn't.

With only moments before the interview began, how much do I explain to her - or not - (& how much does she care to know - or not) that I'm Oneness Pentecostal? Is it worthy starting & leaving open-ended? The conversation actually veered elsewhere, but I wonder...

* If you're the least bit interested in poetry & wordplay, you must go to Eighth Day Books & buy everything by Scott Cairns, but Philokalia: New and Selected Poems seems like the best deal. Cairns is actually teaching at my alma matter now - Univeristy of Missouri-Columbia - but it's the quality of his poetry that shines through. That, & his deep Orthodox beliefs. Completely built my faith by listening to him discuss art & poetry. (May be able to share some quotes later tonight.)

Anyway, I always buy a "lark book at one of these things. You know what a lark is; it's the "I don't usually buy this kind of book, but I need to broaden my mind just to see" type of purchase. SO I was thrilled to already have, and get him to sign myPhilokalia: New and Selected Poems, w/a very generous personal message.

* Hmm...so much more. About 1800 attendees for about 100 speakers on a campus of 4500 students.

* Alice McDermott (Charming Billy) spoke last night (her reading was horrendously long - from a new book coming out in Sept - but when she shared her thoughts about dealing with the unpleasant fact of death, they were quite good); Christian poet Luci Shaw's kickoff speech was completely flat (she read her poems in the same tone of voice as her speech & seemed incapable of sharing any "news that stays news" in the phrase of...oh, you know, that one guy. The poet who supported facism in Italy. Sorry, it'll come to me).

* Need to go grab a good seat for Salman Rushdie as I have 2 First Edition Satanic Verses I want him to sign & don't want to have to wait an hour to do that.

More tonight!




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