Mothers and Daughters: Amy Tan, Marita Golden, & Mary Gordon (2005)

This event occurred on October 14, 2005 at 8:00 pm in the Folger's Elizabethan Theatre.

Four sensational writers explored the conversations—real and imagined—between mothers and daughters.

Marita Golden has written four novels: The Edge of Heaven, And Do Remember Me, Long Distance Life, cited as a “Best Book of the Year” by The Washington Post, and A Woman’s Place. The author of six additional works of nonfiction, including Don’t Play in the Sun: One Woman’s Journey Through the Color Complex, Marita Golden founded the Washington, DC-based Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Foundation.

Mary Gordon is the author, most recently, of Pearl and of the novels Final Payments, The Company of Women, The Rest of Life, and The Other Side, as well as a memoir, The Shadow Man. She is the winner of the Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Writer’s Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the 1996 O. Henry Award for best short story.

Amy Tan is the bestselling author of The Bonesetter’s Daughter, The Hundred Secret Senses, The Kitchen God’s Wife, and The Joy Luck Club, which was nominated for the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award. Her recent memoir is The Opposite of Fate: A Book of Musings, and her new novel, Saving Fish from Drowning, will be released in October 2005.

The readings and discussion were moderated by Deborah Tannen, whose newest book, You’re Wearing That? Understanding Mothers and Daughters in Conversation, will be published in January 2006. A University Professor and Professor of Linguistics at Georgetown, she has published 19 books, including You Just Don’t Understand, That’s Not What I Meant!, Talking Voices, I Only Say This Because I Love You, and Talking From 9 to 5. She is a member of the PEN/Faulkner Board of Directors.