OutWrite DC LGBTQ+ Literary Festival – Aug 11-13, 2023
OUTWRITE LITERARY FESTIVAL RETURNS
WITH LGBTQ+ READINGS, POETRY, PANELS,
AND WORKSHOPS
Three Days with Award-Winnings Authors and Critical Discussions
Washington, D.C. – OutWrite D.C., Washington’s LGBTQ+ Literary Festival returns on Friday, Aug. 11, and runs through Sunday, Aug. 13, 2023, with an all-virtual lineup. OutWrite 2023 features more than 55 LGBTQ+ authors, poets, novelists, playwrights, panelists, and activists participating in educational, entertaining, and enlightening events. Throughout the weekend patrons will encounter spirited readings, panel discussions on current critical topics, and workshops to advance the creation of outstanding LGBTQ+ literature. All events are free and open to the public, with registration encouraged.
OutWrite 2023 is laser focused on cultivating LGBTQ+ inclusivity in all literary genres to reflect and uplift the many voices and stories within the LGBTQ+ community. OutWrite also strives to highlight and celebrate BIPOC, Trans, and Nonbinary writers and readers alike.
OutWrite 2023 explores our LGBTQAI+ identities through literature and discussions, as our community faces unprecedented barrage of attacks threatening our rights to express who we are, what we think, and how we create and relay our experiences to others. It’s crucial now more than ever to offer safe spaces to share, explore, and hopefully expand the understanding of our history and our future. The OutWrite 2023 Literary Festival brings together tremendous talent from around the D.C. region and nation by featuring creatives whose imaginations and intellect supply the fuel for dialogue and change.
—OutWrite Chair Emily Holland
The OutWrite lineup of reading events brings to the D.C. community thought-provoking and powerful voices including: “Trans & Nonbinary Presents & Futures” speaking to the state of unsettling present and the future of queerness;, the “DC Pride Poem-a-Day Reading,” with eight poets celebrating the theme of “Heritage”; the keynote reading and discussion with the New York Times Editors’ Choice recipient Mecca Jamilah Sullivan, author of Big Girl, and a Black, queer, feminist perspective; the Asian retelling of Frankenstein with “The Outsider: Gender and Race in a Binary World;” and the insightful “Where We Stand: Poetry by Lesbians Over 60” which will explore being both the memory of the past as well as the future as spoken by Southern California lesbian poets.
The OutWrite lineup of panels will cover critical, informative and entertaining topics including: “Writing About, With, and Through AIDS,” “Queering the Publishing Industrial Complex,” “At the Gay Bar: LGBTQ+ Bars in History and as Community Centers,” “Queer Stories: Writing Our Way into Belonging,” “Existence as Resistance: Trans Poets on Nationwide Anti-Transness,” and “Queer Lives in Crime Fiction: LGBTQ+ Crime Writers in Conversation.”
The OutWrite workshops will inspire new ways to create art (“Ekphrasis Fantastic”), and explore letter writing as it contributes to the queer experience (“The Queer Love Letter”).
All OutWrite 2023 events will take place virtually, with panels and readings available for live viewing on The DC Center’s YouTube page, with the corresponding recordings uploaded and permanently available after the festival. Workshops will take place via Zoom, registration required.
For more information and the full lineup of OutWrite events, please visit the OutWrite webpage: https://thedccenter.org/outwrite/
From a press release.
