Buzz Town - SF Gate.com

Beth Lisick

October 16, 2002

The perfect place for some serious author spotting was right outside the entrance to the Backflip last Saturday evening. If you’d stood outside the door following the all-day Litquake event, where more than 60 writers did 10-minute readings from noon to 6 pm at the Main Library’s Koret Auditorium and the Hiram Johnson Building, off the Civic Center Plaza, you would have seen Amy Tan entering with a terrier in her purse, sexy lady poets like Kim Addonizio and Daphne Gottlieb (who was wearing her black custom-made “lucky reading” miniskirt), hunky man of letters Po Bronson and boho icon Herb Gold.

As the Turi vodka flowed freely at the bar, I chatted poolside with author Anne Marino, who was getting ready for her reading with Scottish sensation Irvine Welsh later that evening at the very sold-out Edinburgh Castle. Then I found myself in conversation with a group where two-thirds of the people were Fulbright scholars. Has that ever happened in the history of the Phoenix Hotel?

During the day, as authors shuttled between venues to catch readings, you could see Dave Eggers bounding up the library steps as Daniel Handler (a.k.a. best-selling children’s author Lemony Snicket) walked into the Hiram Johnson Building, only to fend off autograph seekers claiming to have 8-year-old nephews. And there was Re/search publisher and back-in-the-day punk V. Vale offering child-rearing advice at the book table, while Litquake organizers writer Jack Boulware and Chronicle writer Jane Ganahl recounted one of the day’s finer moments.

Apparently, after a mild panic set in when City Lights founder Lawrence Ferlinghetti failed to appear for his noontime slot, the reading commenced anyway, only to have Ferlie arrive an hour later, citing either car trouble or just plain forgetting, depending on who you talk to, and immediately put a glow on the crowd by reciting a poem he’d penned just for the occasion. (Hey, maybe that’s why he was late!) Afterward, he left the stage and shot right back toward the exit, where Boulware and Ganahl chased him down. He promptly scribbled his sig on the poem, handed it over to them and was thrilled with what they presented to him in return. The bearded legend was given a “gold” trophy, kind of like the ones you get for high school debate team, but featuring an open book and a flaming Aladdin’s lamp. It read “Litquake 2002 First Place.” He loved it. Not that I think he’d mind, but he was in and out of there so fast, he might not know there are 64 other Bay Area authors trying to figure out what to do with their identical trophies.