International Women's Day

On March 8^th I attended my first literary event in Norwich. It consisted of five-to-ten minute readings of works by Norfolk women authors in honor of International Women’s Day, including Lynn Bryan, Hannah Walker, Kate Moorhead-Kuhn, Beth Settle, Laura Elliot, Clare Jarrett, Deborah Arnanda, Helen Ivory, Kate Foley. I am not sure why these women were chosen. I arrived a few minutes late and there were not pamphlets left with more information about the event.

This was a very informal affair. When I first walked into the Millennium Library, where the event was held, I was very surprised as there were no signs promoting the event or stating where the event was being held in the library. The only way I found the event was overhearing some women speaking into a microphone in a nearby room. The event was very informal: people kept coming in and out throughout the event and everyone was dressed in casual, everyday attire. Everyone seemed to be in the middle class, based on the type of clothes they were wearing --- nice, but not too nice, and definitely not raggedy or worn. Everyone in the audience was Caucasian. There were not enough seats for everyone, and it seemed that people had just grabbed random chairs and moved them over to the area where the readings were being held as they were not set up in any particular way. There were under 100 people in the audience, which it was made up of mainly middle age women, with some elderly and some teenage women as well.  A few middle age men were also there, most likely there with their wives. The lack of male attendance in the audience could be attributed to the fact that it was International Women’s Day. The only children that were there were brought by their mother and they actually were very quiet and attentive during the event. Everyone looked like they really wanted to be there, with exception of the man sitting next to me who, oddly enough, came alone and spent the whole time reading his book. Other than that one man, the audience was very attentive throughout the event and seemed very engaged with the works that were read. The event was not advertised very well, only being listed on a couple websites. In the advertisements there was very little information about the event, just stating the location, that it was free, and a few names of some of the authors that would be in attendance. The event was free, however, at the end, they asked people to give donations to a fund dedicated to helping women.

Except for one African woman from Zimbabwe, all of the authors reading excerpts of their work were white. They ranged in age from late 20s to early 60s. Except for the African woman, all of the readings were either poems or excerpts from a novel, and, weirdly enough, almost every piece read related to death, disease, rape or trauma, or losing something in their lives. For example, one author read an excerpt about when a girl witnessed her mother being raped by the “pea man.” This intrigued me. I am not sure if this theme of loss and suffering was planned, but I doubt it would be on a day that is supposed to celebrate women; I assumed most of the readings would be uplifting or about women empowerment. Most of the women spoke in monotone, only showing a trace of emotion when reading any dialogue their pieces had.  They either seemed like they did not really want to be there and were just going through the motions, or that they were very nervous. The African woman was definitely the outlier out of this group of women, not only in terms of race, but also in terms of her performance. Instead of reading her work, she sang music, most of which was in her native language instead of English. She played a musical instrument similar to a keyboard. Though I am not entirely sure what her songs were about because I could not understand the language, based on the upbeat, happy tune of the music, I could only assume the songs were uplifting and positive as opposed to the darker works the other women read.  I am not sure if the African-American was selected purely for her work or in order to have at least a bit of diversity in the women authors.

I was also intrigued at the way the event was run. There was little, if any, introduction to the women authors and to their work. Many authors did not state their name before they read their pieces. Except for one woman, there was no background given to what their works were about. It was also very hard for me to pay attention and hear the women speak. The event took place on the bottom library floor in the audio visual section near the entrance of the library, so all of the noise being made by people in the Forum outside of the library was carried inside, which was distracting. On top of that, either the microphone was not working or the women were speaking very quietly because it was extremely difficult to hear most of what they were saying. This poor sound system and set-up of the event makes it seem that the people running the event were inexperienced and had a lack of funds delegated to the event. I also noticed that most of the audience members that came in late knew the people that were in charge of the event, as they came over and hugged them as soon as they arrived. This makes me wonder if many of the audience members were there because they were truly interested in the work of these women or if they were there as a favor to their friend.