Origins of an East Bay institution
IN THE WINTER of 2012, the 9st writers group was holding a poetry workshop and celebrating Youssef's birthday. The group was Andrew J Thomas, Patti Orozco Cronin, Paul Corman-Roberts, Missy Church, and Youssef Alaoui. Paul said, "You know, the East Bay needs a poetry festival..." and they looked around at one another and Youssef said, "If it's in the East Bay then we gotta call it Beast something." Andrew said "Everybody knows that East Bay is Pig Latin for Beast." "What is the beast of the East Bay?" Patti said. "Why, it's the cranes out on the water! We used to call them the Guardians of the Gate!" They spoke about the giant metal creatures and Missy said... "The Beast shall walk on four legs!" So that's why our festival's full iteration has three hours of readings and one "hour" of afterparty (although it is known to stretch far into the night) ...
...THESE ARE THE FOUR LEGS OF THE BEAST!
...THESE ARE THE FOUR LEGS OF THE BEAST!
Here's What Happened
Since that evening, the Festival successfully included thousands of readers and audience members; revelers in the power of the spoken word. For seven years straight, once a year in the Summer, Uptown Oakland was filled with literary Beasties holding 10 - 12 readings at a time, for three consecutive hours, and capping off the event with an extraordinary afterparty at one or two restaurants in the area. Writers met other writers, publishers, and curators, people regrouped with friends, old pals, and made new friends. BEAST CRAWL BROUGHT JOY, as was the goal from the very first departure point, sitting in a house by the sea, in the quiet night, on the couch, talking about poetry.
Where we are today
The Beast took some time off and today we have joined with fiscal sponsors Intersection for the Arts. In addition, we're bringing on permanent local partners to ensure the continuation of a truly great resource for the SF Bay literary community. We will interact with you throughout the year with new offers and projects. In short, we love you and enjoy you very much and it is our mission to not only showcase the amazing wealth of talent in our area, but to offer strategic networking that behooves all involved. We enjoy and celebrate the power of the WORD and what it does for the literary arts community, SF Bay Community, society at large, and humanity in general.
