Binyavanga Wainaina Hits North America’s Litfest Scene

Having just shared the stage with Chinua Achebe for a celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of Things Fall Apart at New York’s Bard College, Kwani? founding editor Binyavanga Wainaina is set to represent Kenya at two more prestigious literary festivals.
On Wednesday, April 30, Wainaina will be speaking at the PEN ‘World Voices’ Festival of International Literature in New York City. This preeminent festival describes itself as “an attempt to enrich and sustain global dialogue,” and involves some of the world’s best writers from several countries.
Next, on Sunday, April 4, Wainaina will lead a discussion on African writing at Quebec’s Blue Metropolis litfest, “the world’s first multi-lingual literary festival,” where this year’s theme is travel writing.
And on September 17, after coming home to preside over Kwani’s own litfest during the first two weeks of August, Wainaina will be delivering the keynote address at the University of Toronto’s “Things Fall Apart at 50″ conference.