Human society has a history of categorizing people based on identity markers such as race, class, gender, sexuality, ability, religion, and many others. We as individuals, however, are so much more complex than our identity markers would suggest.

Intersections will feature authors who have engaged with intersectional identities in their work. All of these artists explore the changes that occur when authority is questioned and differences acknowledged. All of them also offer distinct views of these changes.

Join us for a complicated and challenging discussion of intersections, featuring novelists Tope Folarin (A PARTICULAR KIND OF BLACK MAN), Min Jin Lee (PACHINKO), and Douglas Stuart (SHUGGIE BAIN). The conversation will be moderated by writer and book critic Bethanne Patrick. Live captioning will be available for this event.

This Literary Conversation is held in partnership with the National Museum of Women in the Arts, the only major museum in the world solely dedicated to championing women through the arts. Their Women, Arts, and Social Change initiative highlights the power of women and the arts as catalysts for change.

We are also proud to partner with Politics & Prose as our exclusive bookseller for this event. You can find all our featured authors' books on the Politics & Prose website!

A Particular Kind of Black Man by Tope Folarin

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart

Tope Folarin is a Nigerian-American writer based in Washington, DC. He won the Caine Prize for African Writing in 2013 and was shortlisted once again in 2016. He was also recently named a "writer to watch" by the New York Times and among the most promising African writers under 40 by the Hay Festival's Africa39 initiative. He was educated at Morehouse College and the University of Oxford, where he earned two Masters degrees as a Rhodes Scholar. He is the author of A Particular Kind of Black Man.

Min Jin Lee is a recipient of fellowships in Fiction from the Guggenheim Foundation (2018), the Radcliffe Institute of Advanced Study at Harvard (2018-2019), and the New York Foundation for the Arts (2000). Her novel Pachinko (2017) was a finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction, a runner-up for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, winner of the Medici Book Club Prize, and a New York Times 10 Best Books of 2017. A New York Times Bestseller, Pachinko was also a Top 10 Books of the Year for BBC, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and the New York Public Library. Pachinko was a selection for “Now Read This,” the joint book club of PBS NewsHour and The New York Times. It was on over 75 best books of the year lists, including NPR, PBS, and CNN. Pachinko will be translated into 30 languages. In 2019, Apple ordered to series a television adaptation of Pachinko, and President Barack Obama selected Pachinko for his recommended reading list, calling it, “a powerful story about resilience and compassion.” Lee’s debut novel Free Food for Millionaires (2007) was a Top 10 Books of the Year for The Times of London, NPR’s Fresh Air, USA Today, and a national bestseller. In 2019, Free Food for Millionaires was a finalist for One Book, One New York, a city-wide reading program. Her writings have appeared in The New Yorker, NPR’s Selected Shorts, One Story, The New York Review of Books, The New York Times Magazine, The New York Times Book Review, The Times Literary Supplement, The Guardian, Conde Nast Traveler, The Times of London, and Wall Street Journal. She served three consecutive seasons as a Morning Forum columnist of the Chosun Ilbo of South Korea. In 2018, Lee was named as an Adweek Creative 100 for being one of the “10 Writers and Editors Who are Changing the National Conversation” and a Frederick Douglass 200. In 2019, Lee was inducted in the New York Foundation for the Arts Hall of Fame. She received an honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters from Monmouth College. She will be a Writer-in-Residence at Amherst College from 2019-2022. She serves as a trustee of PEN America, a director of the Authors Guild and on the National Advisory Board of the Immigration Initiative at Harvard.

Douglas Stuart is a Scottish - American author. His debut novel, Shuggie Bain, won the Booker Prize and was a finalist for the National Book Award in Fiction, The Kirkus Prize, the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, the Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction. It was a staple of best of the year lists, and is to be translated into twenty-two languages.

He wrote Shuggie Bain over a ten year period and is currently at work on his second novel, Loch Awe.

His short stories, Found Wanting, and The Englishman, were published in The New Yorker magazine. His essay, Poverty, Anxiety, and Gender in Scottish Working-Class Literature was published by Lit Hub.

Born in Glasgow, Scotland, he has an MA from the Royal College of Art in London and since 2000 he has lived and worked in New York City.

Bethanne Patrick, PEN/Faulkner Vice President and Programs Committee Chair, is a writer and book critic whose reviews and author profiles frequently appear in The Washington Post, The LA Times, NPR Books, and Lit Hub.

The National Museum of Women in the Arts is the only major museum in the world solely dedicated to championing women through the arts. Their Women, Arts, and Social Change initiative highlights the power of women and the arts as catalysts for change.