Percival Everett (Courtesy photo).
CLEMSON — The Clemson Literary Festival returns April 2-4 with National Book Award winner Percival Everett as the headliner.
The annual festival is organized by students in the Department of English, under the direction of Principal Lecturer and faculty advisor, John Pursley. Though it has evolved over time, the festival has been a consistent opportunity to celebrate Clemson’s rich literary scene and equip students with hands-on experience in the literary world.
Pursley notes his excitement about guiding students through this experience.
“What I really love is working with the students and watching as they grow more confident in their abilities to manage and direct different avenues of an event with this many moving parts. The teamwork this year has been especially impressive, and we are starting to get very excited about seeing all of our efforts come to fruition.”
Festival headliner Percival Everett recently won the National Book Award for his novel James (2024). James reimagines Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain by telling the story through the perspective of Jim, an escaped slave and Huckleberry’s travel companion.
Everett’s other titles include Dr. No (finalist for the NBCC Award for Fiction and winner of the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award), The Trees (finalist for the Booker Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction), Telephone (finalist for the Pulitzer Prize), So Much Blue, Erasure and I Am Not Sidney Poitier. He has received the NBCC Ivan Sandrof Life Achievement Award and The Windham Campbell Prize from Yale University.
Everett’s work goes beyond the page. His novel Erasure inspired the feature film American Fiction, which was released in 2023 and was awarded the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. Everett teaches at the University of Southern California as a Distinguished Professor of English.
Percival Everett’s headliner reading with be held on Thursday, April 3 at 8 p.m. in the Strom Thurmond Institute Auditorium.
The festival will include a daily book fair, visiting writer readings, workshops, and discussions, faculty readings and various other literary-themed events. A full schedule can be found on the Clemson Literary Festival website.
Visiting writers include Adam O’Fallon Price, Ashleigh Bryant Phillips, Dan Leach, Danni Quintos, Dustin Pearson, Jeremy Michael Clark, José Olivarez, Justin Phillip Reed, L. S. McKee, Reginald McKnight, Stephen Hundley and Toni Jensen.