Plenty of stories to celebrate

Published 10:15 pm Wednesday, April 18, 2018

Storytelling in all of its forms will be celebrated at a festival this weekend, and we may be a little biased, but we can’t think of a better thing to celebrate.

Humans have been telling stories since before there was written language. Thousands of years removed from that, we here in 2018 have just as much, if not more, to celebrate. With the ubiquity and accessibility of the internet, these days almost anyone can tell their own story, someone else’s story, or a fiction story in almost any form they choose.

Fortunately for folks in Suffolk, Paul D. Camp Community College is returning its popular favorite Suffolk Literary Festival from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. this Saturday at the Hobbs Suffolk Campus, 271 Kenyon Road. It is free and open to the public.

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There will be a poetry workshop, literary rap battles, a storytelling program by professional raconteur Via Goode, a workshop on comic books and visual storytelling, a unique twister on readers’ theater, a panel of local writers and more.

Presented this year in a partnership with the Suffolk Public Library, the festival was founded by the college’s Literary Club, which was led at the time by Ronette Jacobs, assistant professor of English at the college. It was last held in 2015.

The return of the festival is meant to honor Jacobs’ work while at the same time providing the event in service to the Suffolk community — and in celebration of storytelling.

As an institution that is proud to tell the stories of those who live, work and play in Suffolk every day, we are pretty sure this is an event that will be worth your time.

“At Paul D. Camp Community College, I wanted to instill my love for literature and reading not only to students but to the community,” Jacobs told a reporter recently for a story on the festival. “I wanted to connect those with the love of reading and inspire others to read more.”

We think that’s an admirable goal. We thank Jacobs, the Literary Club, the college and the library system for providing this excellent event and hope to see everybody there.