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Inaugural Santa Fe Literary Festival connects authors and readers

Adecade ago, Clare Hertel, Julia Platt Leonard and Mark Bryant planted a seed of an idea. Each has a career within the literary world and hoped that something would come to fruition. Beginning on Friday, May 20, the inaugural Santa Fe Literary Festival kicks off with some of the biggest names in the literary world.

The festival is a four-day, multievent gathering where local and global writers and readers will connect in a shared love of language, storytelling, books, ideas and more.

Some may ask why Santa Fe?

“The vibrant literary history of Santa Fe — and all of New Mexico — spans centuries and cultures,” the trio said. “This history is filled with stories and books spoken and written in communities statewide, which literary luminaries, both native and newcomer, have long called home. A literary festival seems so obvious for Santa Fe, where art markets and cultural festivals are a major draw for locals and visitors alike. As a city that takes great pride in its multicultural traditions and landscapes, we believe it’s a natural for a new festival tradition that engages and inspires people in the universal power of story and place.”

In addition to whetting a reader’s appetite, there will also be a culinary element to the festival.

Hertel says food writing and all that it entails is a hugely popular literary genre.

“It not only speaks to the universal need to eat, it taps into our individual culinary traditions and experiences,” she says. “Growing, preparing, tasting and sharing food is a cultural and communal experience, one which New Mexicans passionately embrace. Festival visitors will have the opportunity to break bread with celebrated chefs and cookbook authors, who will discuss how the many facets of food — memory, agriculture and the environment, and the storytelling that takes place around the table — quite literally sustain us.”

More information can be found at santafeliteraryfestival.com.