Sustaining Community

"You say you love the world, so love the world." ~Ada Limón, 24th Poet Laureate of the United States

In times of difficulty— of suffering and trauma, violence and grief— our connections to one another become an engine of survival, and the work of cultivating and sustaining those bonds becomes both vital and deeply complex. In times of comfort, peace, and celebration, our communities extend and magnify our joy. No matter the state of the world, we are responsible to one another: interconnected and interdependent. Join us for the 45th Annual ODU Literary Festival, as we celebrate literature's capacity to forge and preserve community, work that examines the ways we live in relationship to one another, and remarkable writers who sustain—and are sustained by—the communities in which they live, work, and make.

~ Kent Wascom & Molly McCully Brown, 2022 ODU Literary Festival Co-directors