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Featured Speakers

Award-winning novelists, eminent scholars, and a historical spotlight on one of the masters of English fiction.

Common Reader Keynote Angie Cruz
Angie Cruz
Common Reader Keynote · 2025 USA Fellow · 2025 John Dos Passos Prize

Angie Cruz is a New York–born Dominican author of multiple acclaimed novels, including Dominicana (2019) and the 2027 Convention's Common Reader text, How Not To Drown in A Glass of Water (2022). Her recent honors include a 2025 USA Fellowship and the 2025 John Dos Passos Prize for Literature. She currently teaches at Columbia University and is a co-founder of the literary journal Aster(ix). 2027 Common Reader Text: How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water.

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Spotlight Programming Lead Devoney Looser
Devoney Looser
Spotlight Programming Lead · Eminent Austen scholar and author of Wild for Austen, Sister Novelists, and The Making of Jane Austen.

An eminent Austen scholar and author of Wild for Austen: A Rebellious, Subversive, and Untamed Jane (2025). Looser leads the convention's Spotlight Author programming, framing Austen's craft, controversies, and continuing influence on English-language fiction.

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2027 Spotlight Author Jane Austen
Jane Austen
Spotlight Author · 1775–1817 · Master of technê. Programming led by Dr. Devoney Looser.

Featured as a master of technê: Austen's contributions to the modern novel, her breakthrough use of free indirect discourse, her psychologically nuanced characters, and her structural innovations, continue to shape what English-language fiction can do.

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Convention registration includes the Common Reader keynote and all Spotlight Author programming.

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