Events

Our collaboration with Northshire Bookstore continues with a special pre-publication event celebrating Lynn Freed’s novel The Last Laugh, scheduled for release in July 2017. Be among the first to hear an excerpt from this witty new novel about three self-proclaimed “old bags” who run off to a Greek island to escape their children and grandchildren. At first, barefoot and contented, they think they’ve rediscovered the wheel. But when lovers, ex-lovers, swindlers, children, and grandchildren start turning up with alarming frequency, things go awry. As Bess writes in one of Ruth’s weekly “Granny a Go Go” columns, this is not an Enchanted April sort of year.

Lynn Freed’s six previous novels have received rave reviews everywhere from The New York Times Book Review (“Makes us laugh while packing, finally, a punch” ), to The Los Angeles Times Book Review (“Deeply absorbing and ambitious . . . Astonishingly vivid”). In The Last Laugh she returns with a beautifully written and very funny novel about money, sex, friendship, and the pleasures and perils of children.

Everyone at Yaddo would like to thank our sponsors for their generous support of the 2017 Yaddo Summer Benefit!

In June of 2017, our program featured best-selling author and former Yaddo resident, Terry McMillan, whose signature humor, wisdom, and warmth made Waiting to Exhale, A Day Late and A Dollar Short, The Interruption of Everything, How Stella Got Her Groove Back, Getting to Happy, among others, all best sellers. The award-winning film adaptations of Waiting to Exhale and How Stella Got Her Groove Back became box office hits. Now Terry is back with I Almost Forgot About You. Hundreds of guests joined her for a lively discussion and a were able to ask her questions about her successful career.

We are excited to announce that much-needed restoration of our 124 year-old Mansion will start this summer and, with the two year closure of this historic building, so we were able to enjoy and experience another area of the extensive Yaddo property, with a tented event in a location rarely seen by the public.

The proceeds from the benefit play a crucial role in ensuring that our artists’ residency program continues to flourish. The power of art and literature to help us find truth and understand our world has never been more evident or more urgently in need of support. Over 6,500 individuals have created works at Yaddo – literature (fiction, non-fiction, and poetry), paintings, photography, sculpture, music, dance and film – that have helped shape our culture and touched millions of lives.

Preview the 2017 Auction Items that were available here

Join us to celebrate the publication of Yaddo writer Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich’s novel, The Fact of a Body: A Murder and a Memoir (Flatiron Books-Macmillan).

Join us as we celebrate our writers and artists at a series of exclusive private dinners and performances. Full programming and tickets will be made available soon.