New Chapter for Midtown:
1st Annual Book, Artsfest
The Burg Magazine (June 2010)

Saturday June 26 and Sunday June 27th from 9-5 in front of Midtown Scholar on 3rd and Verbeke!

Do you love books? Then picture this:
Books as far as the eye can see. Books about politics. Books about sports. Books about cooking, history. Memoirs, novels, whatever. It’s a book lover’s fantasy, yet it’s that rare fantasy that’s about to come true.

On June 26–27, the 1st Annual Harrisburg Book Festival and Midtown Artsfest will set up its tent on the grassy lot at 3rd and Verbeke streets, just across from the Broad Street Market. But you say you’re not so much into books? Then how about crafts? The arts? Then picture the planning stage as a big book fair has mushroomed into a street celebration of the arts district that Midtown has become. “It’s a huge celebration of the arts, as well as a celebration of the community,” said festival organizer Eric Papenfuse, owner of Midtown Scholar Bookstore-Cafe Outdoors, 10,000 to 20,000 books will be for sale, each priced at under $2. And these aren’t used books. They’re new, from Midtown Scholar’s own warehouse stock.

Dawn Rettinger, co-owner of the HodgePodgery, is drumming up more than two dozen of her shop’s consignors, who will show and sell their wares.

“This is the perfect way to highlight the talent that we have here in Harrisburg,” said Rettinger. Inside Midtown Scholar, another component of the festival will take place. Dozens of local authors will hold forth with readings, lectures and signings. In addition, several academics will discuss topics related to writing, the arts and culture. The big keynote is slated for the night of June 26, when author and teacher Jackson Taylor will speak on the role of writers in our society. Taylor, a Harrisburg native and associate director of the graduate writing program at The New School in New York City, is author of “The Blue Orchard,” a just-published novel set in Harrisburg. “There is a hunger in the community for an event like this,” said Papenfuse. “It’s a celebration of books and the arts and of crafts and of Midtown.”

Here is a taste of “The HodgePodgery” of the vendors that will be there!