UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — The Marathon Read will again occupy Pattee Mall for a community reading event on Thursday, Sept. 13. The event’s theme is “Pages from 1968” and will commemorate 50 years since the watershed months of 1968, with resonant texts from that year, including Philip K. Dick’s novel "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" and works from Joan Didion, Gwendolyn Brooks, Alice Munro, Jorge Luis Borges, Susan Sontag, and Galway Kinnell.
In addition to the landmark cultural and political impact of 1968, the year was notably rich for literary production. “Pages from 1968” will include the iconic Philip K. Dick novel — later adapted as the 1982 film "Blade Runner" — as well as short stories, memoirs and poetry, each representative of the tension of the time.
This year marks the seventh edition of the annual event, and students, staff, faculty and community members will read from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. It is free and open to the public. Food will be provided at points throughout the event, and readers will receive a T-shirt.
Participants will read out loud for five-minute intervals. Special guests, including Sue Paterno and Penn State women's volleyball head coach Russ Rose, will kick off the reading at 10 a.m.
To learn more about the Marathon Read or to sign up to read, visit marathonread.psu.edu.
The event is sponsored by the College of the Liberal Arts; Paterno Fellows Program; Department of English; Center for Global Studies; Center for American Literary Studies; School of Global Languages, Literatures, and Cultures; Department of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Department of Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese; Humanities Institute; Department of Comparative Literature; Department of French and Francophone Studies; and the Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages and Literature.