Literature

Margaret Atwood

Two-time Booker Prize-Winning Author of over 50 Books, Including The Handmaid’s Tale and its Recordbreaking Sequel,The Testaments

Literature can show us our future—if we look.

Isabel Allende

Most Widely Read Spanish-Language Author Ever | Author of The House of the Spirits and The Wind Knows My Name | Winner of the Presidential Medal of Freedom

Write what should not be forgotten.

James Ellroy

Acclaimed author of The Black Dahlia, L.A. Confidential, American Tabloid, Perfidia, and This Storm

Through crime fiction, we can see the bright truth in our dark secrets.

Teju Cole

Professor of Creative Writing at Harvard | Author of Open City and Tremor | Former Photography Critic for NYT Magazine

This is a time for protest and activism, but it is also a time for subtlety, ambiguity and complexity.

Hua Hsu

Pulitzer Prize-Winning author of Stay True | New Yorker staff writer | CBS Sunday Morning contributor

Telling our own stories enlarges the circumference of our imaginations.

John Kaag

Professor of Philosophy, University of Massachusetts, Lowell | Award-Winning Author of Sick Souls, Healthy Minds and American Bloods

It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life worth living.

Gabby Rivera

Author of Juliet Takes a Breath and the Marvel comic series America

Living a revolutionary life starts with joy.

Patti Smith

Punk rock legend in the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame | Author of Just Kids and Year of the Monkey | Winner of the National Book Award

The idea of redemption is always good news, even if it means sacrifice or some difficult times.

Chuck Klosterman

Renowned Cultural Critic | New York Times Bestselling Author of 10 Books, Including Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs

The goal of being alive is to figure out what it means to be alive.

Clint Smith

#1 New York Times Bestselling Author of How the Word Is Passed and Above Ground | Atlantic Staff Writer

The legacy of slavery still shapes our cities, roads, and stories today. Understanding our history will help us make sense of our world—and fight for a better one.

Carrie Sun

Author, Private Equity

By rethinking our organizational culture, we can find not only success, but meaning at work.

Kwame Anthony Appiah

Author of Cosmopolitanism | One of America's Leading Public Intellectuals | President of the American Academy of Arts & Letters

Honor and shame can be used to change the world for the better.

Suki Kim

New York Times bestselling author of Without You, There Is No Us, Expert on North Korea

What can we learn from totalitarian regimes? And how can we connect with their human victims?

Sir Salman Rushdie

One of the most celebrated writers of our time

What one writer can make in the solitude of one room is something no power can easily destroy.

Stephen Marche

Author of the First AI-Generated Novella, Death of an Author | Writer on AI for The New Yorker, The Atlantic

ChatGPT is blurring the line between human and machine—which means uniquely human creativity is more important now than ever before.

Lavin’s literature speakers — legends and next-wave authors alike — can conjure entire worlds with just language and imagination. But for all their skill on the page, each, importantly, is also an enlivening public speaker.