It wouldn't really be the New Yorker Festival without a little Malcolm Gladwell, would it? Today the New Yorker announced the lineup for its October festival of culture, arts and the written word.
Who's taking part? A lot of the usual suspects, regular and high-profile contributors to the magazine: Malcolm Gladwell, Susan Orlean, Alex Ross and Atul Gawande. Editor David Remnick has dibs on the most-likely-to-be-fun panel, "Live From New York," with Seth Meyers and other staff from "Saturday Night Live."
Those are some of the writers -- but there are also the people they write about. Cellist Yo-Yo Ma; actors Alec Baldwin, Patricia Clarkson and Steve Carell; economist Paul Krugman; fashion designer Maria Cornejo; and screenwriter Aaron Sorkin with “The Social Network” stars Jesse Eisenberg and Justin Timberlake.
Is the appearance of Stephen King surprising? Maybe not -- the once genre-bound writer has appeared in the magazine's pages in recent years. So have poets John Ashbery, Anne Carson, Cynthia Cruz, Jorie Graham and Tracy K. Smith, all of whom will be participating.
If there were any way I could be in New York City for the festival, I would be very tempted to join Calvin Trillin's tasting walk from Greenwich Village to Chinatown.
Authors doing stage presentations on Friday night include Uwem Akpan, Peter Carey, Michael Chabon, Edwidge Danticat, Junot Díaz, E.L. Doctorow, Dave Eggers, Jonathan Safran Foer, Mary Karr, Lorrie Moore, Joyce Carol Oates, Orhan Pamuk, Annie Proulx, Zadie Smith, Wells Tower, Deborah Treisman and Tobias Wolff. Other authors can be found signing books at McNally Jackson: Dick Armey, Roz Chast, Ian Frazier, Paul Goldberger, Jorie Graham, David Grann, Jaron Lanier, Jill Lepore, Paul Muldoon, and Michael Specter.
For the complete roster of events, see the New Yorker Festival website.
-- Carolyn Kellogg
Photo: Malcolm Gladwell. Credit: Brooke Williams / Associated Press