Russell Banks
He is one of the greatest American novelists. For several decades already, Russell Banks has been breathing life into characters from small-town America facing social adversity. An incredibly lucid gaze cast on the US and the state of the world, more precious than ever.
An uncompromising perspective on the American myth
While they belong to the tradition of the great American novel, Russell Banks’s books shatter the myth of all-powerful, white America. Translated into twenty languages, his work has won many international awards.
A major literary voice, Russell Banks is also one of the most engaged: the founder of Cities of Refuge North America, he succeeded Wole Soyinka and Salman Rushdie as the president of the International Parliament of Writers, which works to defend persecuted writers.
A tireless traveller and hardened observer, he is also a member of the prestigious American Academy of Arts and Letters.
A formidable storyteller
Over a career spanning more than 40 years, he has written, among others, Continental Drift (1985), Rule of the Bone (1995), The Darling (2004), Lost Memory of Skin (2011), the story collection A Permanent Member of the Family (2013) and the non-fiction Voyager (2016), which is also a genuine book of life in which he invites his readers to join him on his most memorable journeys.
Three of his works have been adapted for the cinema: The Sweet Hereafter (by Atom Egoyan – Grand Prize of the Jury at Cannes in 1997), Trailerpark and Affliction (directed in 1997 by Paul Schrader).
This meeting will be moderated by Florence Noiville, an author and journalist with Le Monde. She had participated in the Passa Porta Seminar on the theme of ‘the reader’ in March 2018, in preparation of the festival.
Who does Russell Banks write for? What books would he gladly reread today? The answers to these and other questions are available here:
book signing
Russell Banks will sign his/her books at 11:30 at La Bellone. Books will also be for sale at the signing.
Passa Porta, La Bellone
Photo Russel Banks © Cyrille Choupas
Coming soon at
meet the author : guiliano da empoli
The Wizard of the Kremlin missed out on the Prix Goncourt in France but that hasn’t stopped it from being a bestseller. Having just won the Choix Goncourt in Belgium, the Swiss-Italian writer Giuliano da Empoli will kick off the Passa Porta Festival!
Een feministische kijk op het begijnhof
Het nomadische Passa Porta Festival strijkt dit jaar ook neer bij de Sint-Jan Baptist ten Begijnhofkerk. Een mooie gelegenheid om kennis te maken met de wijk waar ooit de begijnen hun toevluchtsoord vonden.
Brussels International: Aleksandra Lun on mother tongues and other languages
The world of writers who also excel in a language that is not their mother tongue is absolutely fascinating.