Litquake 2024

Sponsored by Yerba Buena Gardens Festival
Co-presented with 48 Hills

A space in motion that embraces love and tenderness to celebrate queer poetics and recognizes the miraculousness of the queer BIPOCX tongue. From the margins of hxstory, we have continuously broken open lung, redefining the poem and her purpose over and over again, making your larynx in our image. We are thousands upon thousands years old. We are the queer at the tip of your tongue, sculpting the language of each other's bodies. This year, the Pocho Chicanx Poetxs Lourdes Figueroa and Baruch Porras Hernandez team up to bring you a kaleidoscope of voices—MK Chavez, Hilary Cruz Mejia, Jessica Ke'mani, Syd Staiti, Yeva Johnson, and Evelyn Donaji & Camellia Boutros—that have formed and continue to form the Bay Area literary landscape. We seek to tremble your vagus nerve. FREE, $10-15 suggested donation

Every writer starts somewhere—and we’re giving young writers ages 12–18 a space and tools to get started. Spend an afternoon writing together in community at the beautiful, cozy Black Bird Bookstore! Anna Gabrielle Casalme of Novelly, a platform that publishes diverse literature by young people, will facilitate writing prompts and offer advice on what it takes to grow as a writer and maybe even get your work published someday! There’ll be time for sharing work, asking questions, getting to know other young writers, and drinking hot chocolate—your first mug’s on us! FREE

Sponsored by Yerba Buena Gardens Festival
Co-presented with 48 Hills

Finding Home follows the journeys of authors who have fought for their sense of belonging, safety, and nourishment by overcoming adversity, reframing their identity, and building community. These poets will be sharing pieces that celebrate the full breadth of the human experience and what "home" means to them. Rhea Joseph presents Lorrie Chang, Papi Grande, Serena Chan, and Denise Masiel. FREE, $10-15 suggested donation

Sponsored by Yerba Buena Gardens Festival
Co-presented with 48 Hills

Join a conversation among poets in the lineage of June Jordan's Poetry for the People who write and speak into liberation struggles from America to Palestine. Noor Brody presents Dina Omar, Tehmina Khan, and more. FREE, $10-15 suggested donation

Co-presented with Gray Area with 48 Hills

Disinformation. Propaganda. Artificial intelligence. PSYOPS. Litquake brings together three thinkers to illuminate how the American mind has been gamified by bad actors, creating an invisible battlefield where our democratic future is at stake. In Stories Are Weapons, bestselling author Annalee Newitz delves into America’s deep-rooted history of PSYOPS, from Benjamin Franklin’s Revolutionary War–era fake newspaper to 21st-century culture warriors, transforming democratic debates into toxic wars over American identity. In Playing With Reality, Kelly Clancy chronicles the riveting and hidden history of games from the Enlightenment to now, where games inform our daily lives: the social media and technology that can warp our preferences, polarize us, and manufacture our desires. MacArthur-winning artist and author Trevor Paglen’s work often delves into state secrecy and mass surveillance through the lens of games, image-making, investigative journalism, and numerous other disciplines. Panel moderated by Mother Jones senior reporter and producer for Reveal from the Center for Investigative Reporting, Michael Montgomery. $10

Book sales for this event coordinated by Dog Eared Books.