Concord and Lowell, Massachusetts
Two weeks of talks, readings, and discussion celebrating the written and the spoken word.
Roy Blount Jr.
Carole Boston Weatherford
James Wood
Jennifer Haigh
How You Can Participate
- Attend: Most events are free. All events are open to the public. Events that require a ticket are so indicated and include information about how and where to obtain tickets.
- Donate: The festival is produced by a non-profit foundation and depends greatly on individual support. Tax deductible donations in any amount are encouraged and can be made online.
- Sponsor: Corporate sponsorship is welcomed and is available. For information please .
Robert Richardson
Events: Emerson: Transcendentalism and Education
Book: Emerson: The Mind on Fire, William James: In the Maelstrom of American Modernism
Robert Richardson is the author of three biographies, Henry Thoreau: A Life of the Mind (1986), Emerson: The Mind on Fire (1995), and William James: In the Maelstrom of American Modernism (2006). He considered himself fortunate to move to Concord in 1949 when he was 15, but it was not until he went to Denver to teach in 1964 that he discovered that Transcendentalism as a way of life could be followed anywhere and anytime.
He is married to Annie Dillard and divides his time among Cape Cod, Key West, and Hillsborough, North Carolina. His new book, First We Read, Then We Write: Emerson on the Creative Process, will be published next spring by the University of Iowa Press. He is also working on a group biography set in eleventh century Persia and centered on the poet of the Rubaiyyat, Omar Khayyam.