Red Room Where the Writers Are

Thanks to all who joined a packed house to hear this week’s Commonwealth Club panel on Red Room. It was a great evening for writers to meet and discuss their thoughts on community. The discussion was recorded for radio and filmed by our production team, so please visit the site soon to hear and view segments of the event.

And, personally, I loved the opportunity to meet our panelists and literary greats: Peter Coyote, Bill Hayes, Ishmael Reed, and Belle Yang.

Coyote, of The Diggers, Counterpoint Press, stage, screen, and all sorts of fame, told us that “before Jack London there were writers in California.” He is in the middle of compiling an anthology of some ten thousand years of California writers, reminding us that “West Coast culture is older than the 60s.”

The prolific and legendary Reed, who, as a champion of small presses and journals, has aimed to diversify voices in American media, told us it is his “job to service younger writers.”

Yang, who has penned and illustrated stunning books, spoke about making true friends on Red Room. She even read from a moving blog post by nonfiction writer and fellow panelist, Hayes, who may call himself “a lone wolf,” when it comes to his profession, but has welcomed new company (and new readers) by blogging and promoting his work on the site.

Stay tuned for my one-on-one interviews with the panelists. (Sneak preview: Ishmael Reed told me about one of HIS first mentors when he was growing up in Harlem…Langston Hughes!)