A Literary Feast logo, via screenshot.
Have you ever wanted to read a book and discuss it with neighbors and new friends? Do you like attending parties where your food is matched to your literature and you’re encouraged to dress up and be transported to another place? Do you like it when you attend such parties and you know that your money is going to a good cause?
Yes? Yay! It’s Literary Feast time and you’re all cordially invited! The dinners will take place on Saturday, October 27. They will start at neighbors’ homes at 6:30 p.m. and later move on to the Hill Center, from 8:45 p.m. until 11 p.m.
The dinner party-cum-book-club tradition, which has been going strong since 2006, started as an event to help raise funds for Capitol Hill Community Foundation’s School Libraries Project. The event, which according to Todd Cymrot, co-chair of the event, started out modestly and was inspired by a similar fundraiser in New York, can no longer be called modest: A Literary Feast raises about $40,000 every year. In turn, the Capitol Hill Community Foundation shares the neighborhood’s generosity through grants for schools and youth-based programs. You can take a look at past grant recipients by clicking here.
If you’ve never taken part in a Literary Feast party, the concept is simple: Several households will pick a book and host a dinner. At the end of the evening, everyone congregates at the Hill Center, 921 Pennsylvania Avenue SE, to enjoy dessert and mingling. The dinners are varied and many of them cater to dietary restrictions: From the pescatarian-friendly mezé lushness of One Hundred and One Nights to getting along in spirit and stomach with Jodi Picoult’s Small Great Things, there is a meal out there for you. Click here to read through the dinner/book offerings and click here to register.
If you go:
WHAT: A Literary Feast, a night of reading, dining and getting to know your neighbors
WHEN: Saturday, October 27, 2018
WHERE: At private homes starting at 6:30 p.m. and at the Hill Center starting at 8:45 p.m.
WHY: To support the Capitol Hill Community Foundation, which in turn supports schools and organizations throughout the neighborhood.