The Authors Conference kicks off the next day on Saturday, February 27th and will cost you $40 to get in the door for the day. The Saturday Authors Conference runs from 9a.m.-5p.m. During the day you’ll get to hear writing advice and stories from such notable authors as Natalie Baszile, Beth Ann Fennelly and Tom Franklin. Plus, Craig Johnson, Jamie Mason, Laura Lane McNeal and Mark Pryor. It’s a great mix of serious, fun and thriller books.
I have to admit that I was bummed when I saw that this year’s musical guest had to cancel. It’s a shame. She’s great. If you haven’t heard of Kellylee Evans before, you need to watch this video:
How catchy is that? You should also check out her Ordinary People. She has this jazzy blues 60’s pop groove that’s addictive. Maybe Kellylee Evans make it to Birmingham or Hoover someday.
So at 9 a.m. this Friday you can click through to the official site and buy online (the BUY NOW buttons are over in the right sidebar) or you can call (205) 444-7888. Good luck! Tickets to past Southern Voices events have gone fast.
I hope you find yourself this weekend with a book in hand a tall ice cold drink. And some air conditioning or maybe at least shady tree and a hammock.
If you do decide to get out and brave the heat, here are three Birmingham book events and author appearances that you may want to attend over the next 10 days:
Just after World War I things were changing at a rapid pace here in Birmingham, AL. It was against this hasty backdrop of industrialization, cosmopolitan awareness and a sense of “popping up overnight” that the Magic City got its nickname and its first official working writers workshop – The Loafers.
I ran across this entry on BhamWiki.com and had to know more. So I trotted off to the Linn Henley Library and found the bound archived April 1977 issue of The Alabama Review. After reading the article I was blown away at the velocity with which The Loafers cranked out their articles, books, plays, screenplays, essays and short stories.
Made up mostly of newspaper folks, almost all of the original dozen or so members had pieces published in Harper’s, Munsey’s Magazine, The Saturday Evening Post and they even had a couple of O.Henry Prize winners among their ranks.
Roster and occupations of the first members of The Loafers.
The group was founded, in the late 19-teens and early 20’s, by journalist Octavus Roy Cohen, who also wrote fiction, plays, and scripts for Hollywood. He wrote about black life in Birmingham, but one of most popular books was The Crimson Alibi, a detective novel that also made it onto Broadway as a play.
In the 1920’s, Cohen lived in the Diane Apts. on 21st St. South and writers flocked to his place. During gatherings of the literary club / writers workshop, writers would review, critique and edit each others work. As well as cheer and jeer rejection slips, reviews and sales of their books.
I was hoping to list all of the books and works that this group churned out, but it’s just too much. No doubt – they called themselves “The Loafers” as some kind of tongue-in-cheek joke. In fact, in one mention in the January 1922 Writer’s Monthly journal , the reporter states,
“. . .the annual income from the work of the group runs well over the hundred-thousand-dollar mark yearly. . .these twelve men write seven or eight novels a year, usually about one hundred short-stories, besides poems, plays and articles.”
Adjusted for inflation that comes to more than $1.4 million dollars a year this writers workshop was bringing home.
The second generation of The Loafers was lead by Jack Bethea who was another newspaperman and the first editor of the Birmingham Post way back in 1921 when the paper was founded by Scripps-Howard. His group and the dozens after his were just as prolific as the first members.
What I haven’t been able to find is an approximate date of when The Loafers quit meeting and why. Birmingham has been flush with colorful story tellers ever since and we certainly have the setting and history to craft compelling fiction. I wonder why it disbanded. Or better yet – I wonder who would be on the roster if The Loafers was still going strong in Birmingham today?
It’s worth your while to make it down to the Linn-Henley to read the full 8 pages over a lunch break. It’s very interesting ending the April 1977 article with:
“The Civil War had provided an aura for the South’s fiction writers for half a century,. . . World War I and its swift succession of social and economic changes left little room for nostalgia and the gentler scenes it evoked. These Birmingham authors who mockingly called themselves “The Loafers” were alert to the fast-paced life around them and sensitive to human values. Whether in hot indignation at social injustices or with a small at human foibles and fantasies, they wrote perceptively of their own times.”
Tomorrow, Sunday June 21, 2015, the streets around Birmingham’s Alabama Theater will be hopping with Harper Lee fans. Books-A-Million is hosting a showing of the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird from 2 p.m. – 4 p.m. in the Alabama Theater. Outside the showing, a street party will be going on with treats from Yogurt Mountain, southside mexican restaurant Cantina (fish burger, FTW!) and Mr. Harry’s De-Lux chicken.
And, of course, I am sure there will be copies of To Kill a Mockingbird, other books about Harper Lee and TKAM plus a table taking pre-orders for Go Set a Watchman. What bookstore would pass up an opportunity like this to sell books?
Are you going to the street party this Sunday in Birmingham, AL?
The big draw this year is Erik Larson who has written seven books and is best known for Devil in the White City, In the Garden of Beasts and the amazing best-selling book Dead Wake: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania. Dead Wake topped many bookstores’ “Best Books” lists. For $35, you can join Larson and others for a reception on Friday, February 26th.
