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‘Giving voice to our shared Wyoming experience’: literary festival works to expand the narrative

A crowd of people sitting in chairs laugh, smile and applaud, while one person in the background holds up a clipboard with a number score on it.
Nate Shoutis
/
Bookmarked Literary Arts Foundation
The crowd cheers during the poetry slam at the 2023 Bookmarked Literary Arts Festival.

The Bookmarked Literary Arts Festival is back in Lander later this month for its fifth year. The gathering aims to broaden the definition of what literature looks like – and who’s writing it – in the state.

The event brings together more than 30 Wyoming writers, published and unpublished alike, for a weekend of readings, a poetry slam and a keynote speech from award-winning Wyoming author Téa Obreht.

But according to festival founder Ami Vincent, the focus isn’t all cowboy and “Western” genres by any means.

“We have more poets and sci-fi writers sign up than any other genre,” she said. “People are excited to hear those stories and hear the poetry. It just really paints this much more nuanced picture of who we are as the people who live in Wyoming.”

Vincent added that Lander has two well established and published young adult sci-fi writers, Aften Szymanski and Lillian Clark, but they largely go unrecognized.

“Nobody knows they’re here because Wyoming has branded ourselves, and on the national stage, our brand is this Western cowboy thing,” she said.

For Vincent, the goal isn’t to take away from that “Western cowboy thing,” which she acknowledged is a reality for some and is a big part of the success of well-known Wyoming authors like C.J. Box and Craig Johnson. Instead, it’s all about expanding the narrative.

“We are more than that also, right? Like, we're more complex. We are not just cowboys,” she said.

The idea for the Bookmarked Festival took root when Vincent was working at the Lander Library and was approached by a local woman in her 80s who’d just published her first book about Wyoming’s former Sen. Lester Hunt.

She said the library had been approached by other authors before, but there was something about that request that got the wheels turning.

“That really got me thinking, like, ‘Okay, we keep getting this request and there must be a lot of local authors that are here around Lander in particular and in Wyoming more broadly,’” she said. “There's all sorts of arts festivals, but there's not really anything that exists like that for writers.”

The festival kicked off in 2020 and was “successful in its very small COVID- constricted way.” Vincent said since then, attendance has roughly doubled every year, with around 250 coming to the festival in 2023.

A crowd of people of all ages sit in chairs and listen as a man with a red beard reads aloud at a podium at the front of the room.
Nate Shoutis
/
Bookmarked Literary Arts Festival
Riverton author Alma Law reads a submission during the Youth Short Story Contest at the Bookmarked Literary Arts Festival in 2023.

One of the biggest highlights of the weekend for Vincent is the Youth Short Story Contest Award Ceremony, which kicks off the festival every year. Prior to the event, 4th through 12th graders submit stories for consideration and then the winners have the opportunity to read their pieces or have someone else read them at the awards ceremony.

“These kids are writing things from really genuine places inside themselves and telling meaningful stories that don't always fit that traditional narrative of who and what Wyoming is,” said Vincent. “I just find it to be a really beautiful, inspirational way to kick off the weekend every year.”

New this year, kids can enjoy listening to children’s authors reading their books for Family Story Time at the Lander Library on Oct. 12.

The festival goes from Oct. 11 to 13 and is free and open to all.

Hannah Habermann is the rural and tribal reporter for Wyoming Public Radio. She has a degree in Environmental Studies and Non-Fiction Writing from Middlebury College and was the co-creator of the podcast Yonder Lies: Unpacking the Myths of Jackson Hole. Hannah also received the Pattie Layser Greater Yellowstone Creative Writing & Journalism Fellowship from the Wyoming Arts Council in 2021 and has taught backpacking and climbing courses throughout the West.

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