Twenty Summers

Esteemed poets Heid E. Erdrich and Eric Gansworth join visual artist Andrea Carlson in conversation to celebrate the release of Heid E. Erdrich’s latest, Little Big Bully (Penguin Group, 2020), and Eric Gansworth’s Apple: (skin to the Core) (Levine Querido, 2020), both out on October 6th, 2020. The longtime friends talk procrastination, expectations to act as cultural informants, and much more.Interspersed throughout the discussion are readings from Little Big Bully and Apple: (skin to the Core).**Heid E. Erdrich is the author of seven collections of poetry. Her writing has won fellowships and awards from the National Poetry Series, Native Arts and Cultures Foundation, McKnight Foundation, Minnesota State Arts Board, Bush Foundation, Loft Literary Center, First People’s Fund, and other honors. She has twice won a Minnesota Book Award for poetry. Heid edited the 2018 anthology New Poets of Native Nations from Graywolf Press (2018). Heid grew up in Wahpeton, North Dakota and is Ojibwe enrolled at Turtle Mountai

Recorded by Twenty Summers on August 18, 2020. All Rights Reserved.Authors Damon Young and Rion Amilcar Scott kick off the first-ever virtual Twenty Summers festival with an epic, sprawling conversation about barbershops, Covid’s impacted on their work, Lovecraft Country, humor in writing, I May Destroy You, Kanye West, Black success, and the perils of white validation.Damon Young is a writer, critic, humorist, satirist, and professional Black person. He's a co-founder and editor in chief of VerySmartBrothas—coined "the blackest thing that ever happened to the internet" by The Washington Post and later acquired The Root—and a columnist for GQ. His work has been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, LitHub, Time Magazine, Slate, LongReads, Salon, The Guardian, New York Magazine, EBONY, Jezebel, and the Pittsburgh Post Gazette. His debut book, What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker, won the Barnes & Noble Great Discovery Prize for Nonfiction (2019).Rion Amilcar Scott is the author of the sto

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on August 3, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved. 

"Meet Jeremy O. Harris: The Queer Black Savior the Theater World Needs." So read a recent headline in Out magazine; Vogue anointed him “one of the most promising playwrights of his generation." The hype is understandable. Though still in his final semester at Yale Drama School while this conversation was filmed, Harris has had two plays in production Off Broadway before runaway Broadway success with SlavePlay. Daddy, the second, stars Alan Cumming and Ronald Peet. Joining him on our very own stage to discuss his work and career was cultural critic Emily Bobrow, who observed in the Economist that Harris writes about race and sexuality "with humour, intellectual rigour, nods to pop culture and an engaging sense of spectacle," asking audiences to confront their own complicity in prejudice.Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on June 8, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on May 31, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved. 

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on June 15, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on June 15, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on May 17, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on June 7, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on June 7, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on May 26, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on May 25, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on May 25, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded by Twenty Summers on May 18, 2019. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on May 18, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded at the Hawthorne barn on May 17, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Recorded on May 24, 2019 by Twenty Summers. All Rights Reserved.

Investigative reporter Jodi Kantor and provocative political commentator Andrew Sullivan united for a tête-à-tête on the rapidly changing cultural landscape in the wake of Kantor’s momentous, Pulitzer Prize-winning 2017 New York Times story exposing Harvey Weinstein’s decades of alleged abuse toward women. That story set off a worldwide reckoning that empowered victims to come forward with the truth about men who had been abusing their power in a wide range of fields for years. Sullivan, whom we are honored to welcome for a third appearance on the Barn stage, has spoken out fearlessly as well, at times challenging the most far-reaching effects of the #MeToo movement on privacy and sexuality. We anticipate a timely and riveting conversation. Sponsored by Sharon Fay, Maxine Schaffer, Arthur Cohen and Daryl Otte

Seasoned singer-songwriter, performing artist, and author, Dar Williams, joined us for a solo concert in the Hawthorne Barn on May 26, 2018, where she shared her music from her extensive collection of folk tunes, along with stories from her many journeys and experiences.

Tony Award–winning playwright J.T. Rogers (Oslo) and seasoned foreign correspondent Rajiv Chandrasekaran (National Book Award finalist for Imperial Life in the Emerald City) sat together on June 9, 2018 in the Hawthorne Barn to discuss the intersection of politics, war, journalism, and art. J.T. Rogers’s plays include Oslo, Blood and Gifts, The Overwhelming, White People, and Madagascar. For Oslo he won the Tony, New York Critics, Outer Critics, Drama Desk, Drama League, Lortel, and Obie awards. As one of the playwrights for the Tricycle Theatre of London’s The Great Game: Afghanistan he was nominated for an Olivier Award. His works have been staged throughout the United States and in Germany, Canada, Australia, and Israel. He is a Guggenheim fellow and has received three NYFA fellowships in playwriting. Rogers is a member of the Dramatist Guild, where he is a founding board member of the Dramatists Legal Defense Fund. He is an alum of New Dramatists and holds an honorary doctorate from his alma mater, the Un