Life and Literature Along the Medicine Line

Description of Events

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Wednesday, October 8

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8:00 pm
Myrna Loy Center

Special screening of the film The Grapes of Wrath, based on the great American novel by John Steinbeck, in the Myrna Loy Center auditorium. This event, hosted by the Montana Historical Society, launches the Society’s series of programs, readings, and book discussions focused on Steinbeck’s moving and transformative novel of the same name—all part of “The Big Read,” a program of the National Endowment for the Arts. (See www.neabigread.org/books/grapesofwrath/)

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Thursday, October 9

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6:30 pm
State Capitol Building – Old Supreme Court Chambers

“Boundarylines and Crossings,” a very special panel discussion focusing on social, cultural, tribal, and literary issues along the Montana/Canadian border. The panel features Canadian author Tony Rees, former Fort Peck Tribal Chairman Caleb Shields, cultural scholar Michel Hogue, and environmental writer Todd Wilkinson; moderated by journalist Martin Kidston. A reception in the Capitol Rotunda follows the panel discussion.

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Friday, October 10

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12:00 noon
Humanities Lecture
Montana Historical Society auditorium

Krys Holmes, author of Montana: Stories of the Land, will give a brief talk on “Ten Things I Learned Writing about Montana History.” Montana: Stories of the Land is the new Montana History textbook just out from the Montana Historical Society, which will be used in classrooms statewide and also sold publicly through the MHS bookstore and Amazon.com.

3:00 pm
Architecture Series Lecture
Holter Museum of Art

In conjunction with an exhibition at the Holter, art and architecture scholar Hipólito Rafael Chacón , author of the new volume The Original Man: The Life and Work of Montana Architect A.J. Gibson, will give an illustrated talk on the colorful life of one of western Montana’s most beloved early architects. A.J. Gibson’s meteoric career at the turn of the last century and his urban vision helped redefine the western town from a rustic accumulation to a civilized and rational place.

4:00 pm
Student readings
Holter Museum of Art

Helena-area students will be participating in writers’ workshops with Native American writers M.L. Smoker and Joseph Marshall III for several days this week. Come hear these students present their workshopped pieces in a public reading—support young writers!

5:00 pm
Book Fair
Holter Museum of Art

What’s new at our local and regional publishing houses? Come to the book fair to snoop, get new books signed, and pick up new works from previous Helena Festival of the Book authors. A great time to buy Christmas gifts!

7:00 pm
Gala reading
Holter Museum of Art

Joseph Marshall III, author of Hundred in the Hand and The Long Knives are Crying
Kirby Larson, author of Hattie Big Sky
Gregory Pape, Montana’s poet laureate and author of seven books of poetry, including Sunflower Facing the Sun

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Saturday, October 11

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9:00-11:00 am
Writer’s workshops
$25 Advance registration required at 443-0287 or helenabookfest@gmail.com

The Festival offers some of the highest-quality writers’ workshops in Montana. We press into service our visiting authors who are the best teachers. Workshops limited to 15 people. A great opportunity to improve a work in progress, haul out an old work, or just get fired up. Advance registration is required. Workshop locations to be determined.
Fred Haefele – The Art of the Essay
Russell Rowland – Fiction: The Last Best Story
Susanna Sonnenberg - Selective Memory—Mapping the Memoir
Joseph Marshall III – Blending Two Cultures: Creativity and Business

11:30 – 12:30
Poetics Lecture
Holter Museum of Art

“Poetry, Panic, and the Pan-ic experience” by Rusty Morrison
Are poems just another kind of information to be managed and, in periods of panic, held at bay? Or are they actually different in kind—offering a useful antidote in times of stress or anxiety? Do some poems actually enter the body and mind in a different, a more dramatic, performative way than other more discursive, more transparent kinds of information? Poet Rusty Morrison is author of two volumes: the true keeps calm biding its story and Whethering. She has received the 2007 Ahsahta Press Sawtooth Poetry Prize and the 2007 Poetry Society of America’s Alice Fay Di Castagnola Award. For a fuller synopsis of her talk, see the “Workshops and Poetics Lecture” page.

1:30 – 3:00
Tribal Histories Panel Discussion
Holter Museum of Art

Authors and educators from several Montana Indian tribes unveil, introduce, and talk about the newly produced Tribal Histories. These books, DVDs, and other materials produced for the Tribal Histories Project bring an accurate, authentic voice to Montana’s multi-cultural history. The panel includes:
Carol Murray, Blackfeet Community College
Julie Cajune, Salish Kootenai College
Dr. Richard Littlebear, Chief Dull Knife College
Caleb Shields, Fort Peck Community College
Moderated by Denise Juneau, Director of Indian Education for Montana’s Office of Public Instruction.

3:15 – 5:00 pm
Afternoon reading
Holter Museum of Art

Russell Rowland, author of The Watershed Years
Stephenie Ambrose Tubbs, author of Why Sacagawea Deserves the Day Off and Other Lessons from the Lewis and Clark Trail

7:00 pm
Gala reading
Holter Museum of Art

Rusty Morrison, author of the true keeps calm biding its story
Susanna Sonnenberg, author of Her Last Death
Ellen Baumler, author, and J.M.Cooper, photographer, present talk and slide show from their new book, Dark Spaces: Montana's Historic Penitentiary at Deer Lodge

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Sunday, October 12

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Myrna Loy Center
11:30 am
Literary Heritage Program

Rick Newby and Alexandra Swaney, editors of the forthcoming Notes for a novel: The Selected Poems of Frieda Fligelman from Drumlummon Institute, present a spoken word/piano performance of poems by one of the most remarkable and influential characters of early 20th-century Helena.

7:30 pm
Blues at the Myrna:
Henry Gray and the Cats
Tickets $20
Buy tickets at the Myrna Loy Center box office (406-443-0287) or www.myrnaloycenter.com

Close the Helena Festival of the Book by celebrating the living story of the blues. Grammy-winning Henry Gray grew up in the Louisiana juke joints and helped shape the signature sound of Southern blues. When he migrated north to Chicago, he helped shape the Chicago blues piano style, wrote some enduring songs, and became the lead pianist in the legendary Howlin Wolf's band. Now an NEA National Heritage Award recipient, Henry Gray is widely recognized as a cultural treasure. Scholar Dave Kunian says, "Whenever you hear someone play a familiar blues riff on the piano, there's a good chance they got it from someone who learned it off Henry Gray."