Authors and Ideas Festival going online
The 14th annual event returns Sept. 25-27
PEBBLE BEACH >> Thousands of students and teachers will be tuning in next weekend to some of the most dynamic speakers they might ever hear as part of the annual Authors and Ideas Festival in Pebble Beach.
This year will be a virtual affair with host and co-founder Jim McGillen bringing back some of the top speakers featured at the festival over its 13year run. History, medical science, politics and the art of writing compelling television will be just a few of the topics covered by guest speakers this year.
Typically there have been roughly 1,100 students sitting in the auditorium at Stevenson School for the three-day event, but with speakers streamed into virtual classrooms that number could increase 10-fold, McGillen said.
“The key is to find spectacular speakers who convey interesting ideas in an interesting way,” McGillen said. “And this year we have plenty.”
Among the speakers will be Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, who often addresses historical leadership in times of crisis; Ken Burns, a multi-Emmy Award-winning historical documentarian; Academy Awardwinning screenwriter Aaron
Sorkin; groundbreaking primatologist and anthropologist Jane Goodall; and Michael Rose, associate professor of composition at Vanderbilt University’s Blair School of Music.
“Michael brings out a boom box and combines Beethoven and the Beatles,” McGillen said. “At the end he has the whole audience singing ‘Hey Jude.’ ‘’
All told there will be some two dozen experts featured in this year’s lineup.
Certainly, the COVID-19 pandemic has challenged McGillen and his colleagues, adding layers of technical and production complexities that in many ways are more difficult than staging the event at Stevenson School, which he said has been honed to a science.
“Just when I thought I could sit back, this happened,” the 88-year-old said of the pandemic. “While I’m disappointed we couldn’t stage the event like we have in past years, I’m thankful we are still able to bring this to the kids and duplicate what we’ve done in the past.”
McGillen said dealing with the pandemic is just a matter of staying positive and making lemonade out of lemons. Since COVID-19 is part of everyone’s lives now, one of the confirmed speakers will be Dr. Robert Wachter, chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, who will discuss the science behind the virus.
While the speakers certainly
have a celebrity status, it will be the students who garner the lion’s share of attention during the event, with a focus on broadening horizons and stimulating imaginations, he said. Event coordinators are working with nonprofit organizations like the Boys and Girls Club and local libraries to ensure underserved populations of students are able to view the talks.
More information is available at PBAIF.com for the event, which begins Sept. 25. Friday’s schedule begins at 5 p.m., Saturday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday from 9 a.m. to noon.