Chicago Literary Hall of Fame

Chicago has a newly inaugurated Chicago Literary Hall of Fame. The idea for the Hall of Fame came out of a meeting of the Chicago Writers' Association.
On November 20th, the Hall inducted its first six authors - Lorraine Hansberry, Studs Terkel, Gwendolyn Brooks, Nelson Algren, Saul Bellow, and Richard Wright - at an auditorium in Northeast Illinois University.


The first round of inductees were "obvious choices," said Evans, the Hall of Fame's executive director (in addition to its chauffeur). But, he said, it's "going to get tricky going forward.” For instance, would Hemingway be eligible? He was born in Oak Park, a suburb of Chicago, and he attended school there, but "he only wrote one story about Chicago." The fate of L. Frank Baum, who lived in Chicago while he wrote about the land of Oz, was similarly undecided. Evans debated whether a "literary" hall of fame could include more popular writers, like Scott Turrow, or screenwriters, like Ben Hecht. newyorker.