Printers Row Lit Fest, the largest free outdoor literary showcase in the Midwest, returns for its 36th year with 100% free programming for book lovers the weekend after Labor Day, Saturday, Sept. 11 and Sunday, Sept. 12 from 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily in Chicago’s historic Printers Row neighborhood.
Printers Row Lit Fest will be headlined by New York Times bestselling author and National Book Award winner Ta-Nehisi Coates, recipient of the 2021 Harold Washington Literary Award. Coates kicks off Printers Row Lit Fest with a free public event on Saturday, Sept. 11 at 10 a.m. (location to be determined). As in past years, the festival will include blocks of diverse booksellers featuring new, used and original books; events with local and national bestselling authors; and special programming including spoken word performances, writing workshops, and events for children and young adults.
The 36th Printers Row Lit Fest takes place on Saturday, Sept. 11 and Sunday, Sept. 12 from 10 a.m.-6 p.m. daily, in Chicago’s historic Printers Row neighborhood along Dearborn Street from Polk Street north to Ida B. Wells Drive. All festival programs are free and open to the public. For more information, visit printersrowlitfest.org.
Presented by the not-for-profit Near South Planning Board, the highly anticipated 2021 Printers Row Lit Fest follows an unprecedented cancellation last year for the first time in the festival’s 36-year history, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Plans for this fall’s literary celebration will follow city guidelines, with all necessary safety precautions in place.
Ta-Nehisi Coates is an author, journalist, screenwriter, executive producer and professor. He is the author of the bestselling books The Beautiful Struggle, We Were Eight Years in Power, The Water Dancer, and Between the World and Me, which won the National Book Award in 2015. In April 2018, Between The World And Me was adapted for the stage and premiered at the iconic Apollo Theater. In November 2020 it was adapted for film and aired on HBO, and for which Ta-Nehisi was an Executive Producer. His novel The Water Dancer will be turned into a film adaptation – with Ta-Nehisi writing the screenplay – and will be produced by Plan B Entertainment, Harpo Productions and MGM Studios. He is also the current author of the Marvel comic Captain America. Ta-Nehisi is the recipient of a 2015 MacArthur Fellowship. He is currently in his fourth year as a distinguished writer in residence at NYU's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute.
Ta-Nehisi Coates will be honored at the 2021 Harold Washington Literary Award gala, a ticketed fundraiser that supports the not-for-profit Near South Planning Board’s literary programs and officially launches Printers Row Lit Fest. The event takes place on Friday, Sept. 10 at 6 p.m. and more information will be announced in the coming months at thenspb.org.
Near South Planning Board, founder of the Printers Row Lit Fest, is a not-for-profit community-based organization serving businesses, institutions and property owners of the Near South Side of Chicago since 1946.
The Harold Washington Literary Award recognizes diverse and stimulating authors who address issues of contemporary life and whose literary achievements include a significant body of work that has touched the public mind and imagination. Harold Washington, the first African American mayor of the City of Chicago, revered literature and epitomized the diversity of the American experience. The award, which bears his name, celebrates this spirit. The goal of this award is to present examples to the public of creative use of the written word. Recipients of this prestigious award are selected by a cross-cultural committee of representatives from Chicago’s literary community.
Past Harold Washington Literary Award recipients are: Alex Kotlowitz (2019), Rabih Alameddine (2018), Rita Dove (2017), Marilynne Robinson (2016), Edward P. Jones (2015), Stuart Dybek (2014), Art Spiegelman (2013), Sara Paretsky (2012), Edwidge Danticat (2011), Barbara Ehrenreich (2010), Dave Eggers (2009), Scott Turow (2008), Walter Mosley (2007), E.L. Doctorow (2006), Garrison Keillor (2005), Jules Feiffer (2004), Margaret Atwood (2003), Grace Paley (2002), August Wilson (2001), John Hope Franklin (2000), Robert Pinsky (1999), Joseph Epstein (1998), Cynthia Ozick (1997), Isabel Allende (1996), Doris Kearns Goodwin (1995), Zbigniew Brzezinski (1994), Garry Wills (1993), Ralph E llison (1992 ), Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (1991), Saul Bellow, Ray Bradbury, Gwendolyn Brooks, Cyrus Colter, William Maxwell and Studs Terkel (1990), and Susan Sontag (1989).