In the digital age, reading is hardly dead
This past week, 75 literary leaders from across New York state gathered in Rochester for LitNYS’s 2023 Facing Pages Literary Arts Convening, a highly regarded event that has become an annual tradition since its founding nearly two decades ago.
The convening brought together nonprofit literary arts presenters, independent publishers and literary service organizations to foster community, share resources, and strengthen New York’s literary arts landscape.
Greater Rochester enjoys a long, distinguished history in this area; many leaders from the upstate region participated, including Writers & Books, BOA Editions, The Avenue Blackbox Theatre, Tiger Bark Press and Open Letter Books. Leading voices and luminaries in the field were featured, including Writers & Books’ executive director Alison Meyers, who delivered an inspirational talk, “Where We Are: Deepening Identity & Purpose.”
In their every-day practice, New York’s literary arts workers embrace an ethos articulated by the National Endowment for the Arts: “The literary arts inspire, enrich, and educate. They remind us that there is beauty and joy in language, that others have insights worth paying attention to, that in our struggles we are not alone.”
Facing Pages in Rochester was a rare opportunity for attendees from Long Island, New York City, the Hudson Valley, the Adirondacks, and Central and Western New York to build relationships with and between literary presenters and small press publishers. This leads to new collaborations, introduces new writers to the community, and spreads innovative program ideas that benefit local audiences.
Why does this matter? Access to the world of ideas that books provide, and to the skills of reading and writing, are among the most important and fundamental components of life success for people of all ages and backgrounds. Lifelong readers and writers enrich their own journeys and contribute to the intellectual, social, and cultural vibrancy of their communities.
And it matters because participation levels in the literary arts – reading, creative writing, enjoying published work in print and online – are extremely high. With the advent of digital technology, many predicted that reading was dead. How wrong they were.
Three-quarters of all adults read at least one book a year, and print remains the preferred book format. Independent bookstores are on the rise and flourishing, and public libraries remain cherished, popular sites.
Often we don’t realize the riches right in our midst. New York’s literary arts organizations are among the best in the nation, in great measure due to funding and advocacy from the New York State Council on the Arts, which year in and year out makes the case that the literary arts are a necessity.
The Rochester-based convening shone a light on the extraordinary work area literary organizations do to engage youth and adults with opportunities to imagine, create, think critically, and practice empathy. As literary organizations and presses are strengthened, doors to possibility reveal themselves, open, and multiply.
Debora Ott in 2001 founded LitNYS, a coalition of New York state literary arts presenting, publishing, and service organizations. Laurie Dean Torrell has directed the coalition in collaboration with Ott since 2007. Alison Meyers is executive director of Writers & Books.