Previous Conferences by Year
53rd: Communities and the Invidual
March 24-26, 2022
Hanif Abdurraqib, Jessica Bruder, Kelli Jo Ford, Kaitlyn Greenidge, Cal Lane, Sarah
Vogel
52nd: Roots to the Earth
March 24-26, 2021
Aylan Couchie, Ross Gay, Joy Harjo, Marie Mutsuki Mockett, Nnedi Okorafor, Sonia Shah
51st: The Working Classes
September 17-November 19, 2020 (Thursdays)
Reginald Dwayne Betts, Roy G. Gúzman, Laila Lalami, Richard Tsong-Taatarii, Matt Young,
Jenny Zhang
50th: What the Future Holds
March 20-22, 2019
Heid E. Erdrich, Kiese Laymon, Sally Wen Mao, Patrick Martinez, Tommy Orange, Sarah
Smarsh
49th: Truth and Lies
March 21-23, 2018
Molly McCully Brown, Nicholas Galanin, David Grann, Marlon James, Lauren Markham,
and Lorenzo Serna
48th: Citizen
March 22-24, 2017
NoViolet Bulawayo, Jennine Capó Crucet, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Layli Long Soldier, Jeff
Shotts, Mai Der Vang, and Mario Ybarra, Jr.
47th: The Art of Science
April 6-8, 2016
Katharine Coles, Brian Greene, Allison Leigh Holt, Frank Huyler, Tania James, and
Kim Stanley Robinson
46th: The Other Half
March 25-27, 2015
Roxane Gay, Gish Jen, Bonnie Jo Campbell, Carol Muske-Dukes, Alexandra Grant, and
Torill Stokkan
45th: Imagine: A Literary Festival on the Prairie
April 2-4, 2014
Colson Whitehead, Robert Pinsky, Geoff Dyer, Sarah Leavitt, Jessica Lott, and Brian
Maxwell
44th: A Portrait of an Artist
March 19-23, 2013
Tony Kushner, Dorothy Allison, Gary Shteyngart, Mary Jo Bang, Ed Bok Lee, Richard
Bausch, Nick Flynn, Cheryl Strayed
43rd: Humanimal
March 27-31, 2012
Jane Smiley, Mark Doty, Pam Houston, Brenda Miller, Lee Ann Roripaugh, Aaron Poochigian,
Hal Herzog
42nd: (Inter)National Affairs
March 29-April 2, 2011
Jamaica Kincaid, Maxine Hong Kingston, Carl Phillips, Susan Deer Cloud, Loida Maritza
Pérez, Matthew Sienkiewicz, Jim Castellanos, Sean McLain Brown, Amoussa Koriko, Russell
Scott Valentino
41st: Mind the Gap: Print, New Media, Art
March 23-March 27, 2010
Art Spiegelman, Saul Williams, Frank X. Walker, Nick Montfort, Deena Larsen, Mark
Amerika, Stuart Moulthrop, Cecelia Condit, Zeitgeist
40th: Wit
March 31-April 4, 2009
Marco Candida, Jacqueline Osherow, Chuck Klosterman (North Dakota Humanities Council
Lecture), Steve Almond, Charles Baxter (Presidential Lecture), Greg Williamson, Karen
Russell
39th: Revolutions
March 25-29, 2008
Russell Banks (Presidential Lecture), Junot Díaz, Alexandra Fuller, Alice Fulton,
Peter Kuper, Salman Rushdie
38th: Writing the Body
March 27-31, 2007
Stuart Dybek, Mary Gaitskill, Anne Harris (artist), Li-Young Lee, Timothy Liu, Leslie Adrienne Miller, Michelle Richmond, Miller Williams (Presidential Lecture)
37th: Border Crossings
March 21-25, 2006
Carol Gilligan, Barry Lopez (Presidential Lecture), Robin Magowan, Sam Pickering,
Mark Salzman, Fan Shen, Nance van Winckel, Branca Vilela
36th: Hope/Illusion
March 29-April 2, 2005
Chris Belden, Carolyn Forché, Charles Johnson, Marilyn Nelson, Kathleen Norris, Jane
Urquhart, Jane Varley
35th: 35th Anniversary Writers Conference
March 23-27, 2004
Elmaz Abinader, Tony Buba, Annie Dawid, Louise Erdrich (Presidential Lecturer), Albert
Goldbarth, Tony Khalife, Marilynne Robinson, Mark Turcotte, Larry Woiwode
34th: Art & Science
March 24-29, 2003
Natalie Angier, Rafael Campo, Devra Davis, Alison Hawthorne Deming, Thomas Disch,
Ted Mooney, Pattiann Rogers, Oliver Sacks, Julia Whitty
33rd: Explorations
March 18-22, 2002
Kate Daniels, Sharon Doubiago, Eddy Harris, Ursula Hegi, Bill Holm, David Treuer,
Sara Wheeler
32nd: Worklife/Lifework
March 18-23, 2001
Peter Carey, Gary Fisketjon, Kent Haruf, Natasha Trethewey, Joy Williams, Frederick
Wiseman, Ofelia Zepeda
31st: Writing War
March 20-24, 2000
John Balaban, Eavan Boland, Tessa Bridal, Robert Olen Butler, Helen Fremont, Arnold
Isaacs, Ha Jin, Louis Simpson, Barbara Sonneborn
30th: Expressing the Sacred
March 16-19, 1999
Joseph Bruchac, Robert Clark, Mark Doty, Galway Kinnell, Victor Masayesva Jr., Peter
Matthiessen, Ruhama Veltfort, Terry Tempest Williams
29th: The Use of History
March 24-27, 1998
Toi Derricotte, Patricia Hampl, John Hanson, Paulette Jiles, Arnost Lustig, Josef
Skvorecky, August Wilson, Susan Yuzna
28th: Writing Nature: The Nature of Writing
March 18-22, 1997
Susan Griffin, Linda Hogan, Garrett Hongo, Bill McKibben, Bill Morrissey, Annick Smith,
David Treuer, Meeka Walsh
27th: Living in America
April 9-12, 1996
Rosellen Brown, Jon Hassler, Sydney Lea, Li-Young Lee, David Mura, Susan Power, Pattiann
Rogers
26th: States of the Art
March 21-25, 1995
Sherman Alexie, Gordon Henry Jr., Yusef Komunyakaa, Bharati Mukherjee, Tim O’Brien,
Sharon Olds, Marge Piercy
25th: Homelands
April 6-9, 1994
Jonis Agee, Sandra Benitez, Adrian Louis, John Stone, Jervey Tervalon, Larry Watson,
James Whitehead
24th: La Literatura: Contemporary Latino/Latina Writing
March 24-26, 1993
Gloria Anzaldúa, Ana Castillo, Martín Espada, Francisco Goldman, Luisa Valenzuela,
Ed Vega
23rd: A Festival of Publishers and Writers
March 17-20, 1992
Carol Bly, Diane Glancy, Linda Hasselstrom, William Kloefkorn, Ted Kooser, Lon Otto,
David Pichaske, Maura Stanton, Thom Tammaro, Mark Vinz
22nd: The Literatures of Canada
March 18-22, 1991
David Arnason, Ven Begamudre, Di Brandt, Roch Carrier, Madeleine Gagnon, Kristjana
Gunnars, W.P. Kinsella, Dorothy Livesay, Michael Ondaatje, Carol Shields, David Williamson
21st: The Literature of Immigration
March 20-23, 1990
Karen Karbo, James McAuley, Reginald McKnight, Lore Segal, Ron Vossler, Will Weaver,
Solveig Zempel
20th: Circle of Many Colors
April 3-7, 1989
Gretel Ehrlich, Richard Ford, William Least Heat-Moon, N. Scott Momaday, Leslie Silko,
David Solheim, Tobias Wolff
19th: Parent and Child
March 22-26, 1988
Michael Dorris, Louise Erdrich, Patrick Hemingway, Adam Hochschild, Mona Simpson,
W.D. Snodgrass
18th: Writers of the Purple Sage
March 17-21, 1987
Ralph Beer, Joy Harjo, Robert Kammen, Larry McMurtry, Paul St. Pierre, Elizabeth Tallent,
James Welch
17th: To Make a Prairie
March 17-21, 1986
Raymond Carver, Ellen Gilchrist, Rebecca Hill, Maxine Kumin, Jay McInerney, Ernest
Mickler, Robert Ward, John Yount
16th: Narratives
March 18-22, 1985
Ann Beattie, Sandra Birdsell, Amy Clampitt, Jorie Graham, Alex Haley, Barry Hannah,
Norman Mailer, Thomas McGrath
15th: 1984
March 19-24, 1984
Harlan Ellison, Gay Haldeman, Joe Haldeman, Robert Silverberg, Jane Sturgeon, Theodore
Sturgeon, Luisa Valenzuela, Roger Zelazny, Ray Bradbury (via telephone)
14th: The Centennial Year
March 21-25, 1983
Joseph Brodsky, Carolyn Forché, Richard Howard, Bobbie Ann Mason, James Alan McPherson,
James Merrill, Czeslaw Milosz
13th: International Writers
March 22-26, 1982
Ellen Gilchrist, Thomas McGrath, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Susan Sontag, Arturo Vivante,
Derek Walcott
12th: Voices
March 16-20, 1981
Esther Broner, Robert Creeley, Etheridge Knight, Denise Levertov, Ntozake Shange,
Richard Wilbur
11th: The Storytellers
March 17-21, 1980
Harry Crews, Selo Black Crow, James Crumley, James Dickey, June Jordan, Richard Kostelanetz,
Antony Oldknow, Leslie Silko, and Larry Watson
10th: Epitomes, Bombast, and Climaxes
March 19-23, 1979
Edward Albee, Robert Bly, Frederick Exley, N. Scott Momaday, Grace Paley, Megan Terry
9th: The Mirror and the Lamp
March 20-23, 1978
John Ashbery, Amiri Baraka, William Burroughs, Ring Lardner Jr., Tillie Olsen, Eudora
Welty
8th: Literature and Film
March 21-25, 1977
Harlan Ellison, George Garrett, John Houseman, Larry McMurtry, Marcel Ophuls, Joan
Tewkesbury
7th: New Journalism and the Novel
March 15-19, 1976
Truman Capote, Ed McClanahan, B.J. Phillips, Alix Kates Shulman, Larry Woiwode, Tom
Wolfe
6th: Spirit of Place
March 17-21, 1975
John Barth, Wendell Berry, William Gass, Ken Kesey, N. Scott Momaday, Ishmael Reed,
Alice Walker
5th: City Lights in North Dakota
March 18-22, 1974
Gregory Corso, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg, Michael McClure, Peter Orlovsky,
Kenneth Rexroth, Gary Snyder
4th: Women in the Arts
March 12-16, 1973
Gwendolyn Brooks, Carolyn Kizer, Myrna Lamb, Mary McCarthy, Diane Wakoski, Sylvia
Wilkinson
3rd: American Indian Writers Conference
March 20-23, 1972
Frederick Manfred, Ed McGaa, Thomas McGrath, Simon Ortiz, Jerome Rothenberg, James
Welch, Ray Young Bear
2nd: Northern Plains Writers Conference
February 16-19, 1971
David Evans, Roland Flint, Lois P. Hudson, Richard Lyons, Thomas McGrath, John Milton,
Antony Oldknow
1st: Southern Writers Conference on the Arts
April 21-25, 1970
William Anderson, John Carr, Fred Chappel, Jesse Hill Ford, George Garrett, Peter
Taylor, James Whitehead