Observer Writers Weigh in on This Year's Mayborn Conference

By Anna Merlan, Leslie Minora and Brantley Hargrove Tue., Jul. 26 2011 at 12:00 PM

Categories: Books, On The Scene

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Catherine Downes

Attendees at this year's Mayborn Conference did more than just drink. They swear.

Every year, journalists, writers and readers gather at the Hilton DFW Lakes Executive Conference Center in Grapevine for the Mayborn Literary Nonfiction Conference. Dozens of influential and popular writers speak to the crowds, and attendees partake in writing workshops and contests. Observer writers Anna Merlan, Brantley Hargrove and Leslie Minora were at the conference this past weekend, and here are their thoughts on this year's Mayborn.

Anna: So, Mayborn. Brantley's a veteran, so do you want to explain what it is?
Brantley: The first thing you have to understand about the Mayborn is that the setting is unremarkable. Very unremarkable. We're talking about a Hilton conference center near the DFW airport.
Anna: It's remarkably depressing
Brantley: Yes. But it's what happens inside that sets it apart from just about every conference in the country.
Leslie: It's like band camp but for journalists.

Brantley: Not only are there Pulitzer-Prize winning journalists, best-selling book authors, but the audience itself is filled with swinging dicks. And a healthy helping of hopeless memoirists.
Anna: Yeah. That was awkward. I was walking into the hotel the first afternoon, and this lady said to me, "God, there's so much stuff about newspaper reporting at this conference!" and I said, "Yeah, a lot of us are reporters." She paused for a second and then replied, "I should be a reporter! That's a good way to get people to read my memoir."
Brantley: Diane Ackerman was the token memoirist. There's always one to appease that demographic.
Anna: I wasn't there for that. I heard it was.... well, anyway. The first panel I went to the next day was two fellow VVMers, Sara Fenske and Gus Garcia Roberts being interviewed by Michael Mooney. Good god, they were funny. And smart!
Brantley: I was still passed out drunk for that. Wish I could chime in.
Leslie: They were really good -- tales from the trenches sorts of stuff, but from the most hilarious, semi-uncomfortable trenches.
Brantley: How about Frank DeFord? That was the first speaker I was semi-coherent for Saturday. How awesome was he? And how many times did you want to rush the stage and hug him as he spoke about his book, Alex: The Life of a Child, about his young daughter who died of cystic fibrosis.
Leslie: I'd never read anything he wrote, and I left with his book. That pretty much sums it up.

Catherine Downes

There were plenty of toasts at Mayborn.

Anna: Yeah, and I'm going to steal that book from you once you're done with it. He was phenomenal.
Leslie: You're right, I really almost hugged him, still would like to.
Anna: I think at this point we need to discuss the pie.
Leslie: He walked that line of sensitivity and bad-assery.
Brantley: Wait, wait, wait. The pie can wait. We gotta talk about DeFord signing that breast.
Anna: Oh yeah. God, how could I forget?
Brantley: So Frank DeFord is interviewing Jerry Jones. Jerry Jones won't shut up. Finally, a waitress comes up to the table and "proffered her breast" for Jerry to sign. Jerry gladly obliged, but on one condition: She had to let DeFord sign the other. And how did DeFord reply when asked by an audience member later if he signed that boob?
Anna: "You bet I did!" Classic.
Brantley: Applause. Raucous applause. Other gems from DeFord: "The Internet is a buzzard." "Interviewing is really just a high-school date taken to a higher power." Put succinctly, DeFord is old, really tall, and really bad ass.
Leslie: I'm happy you jotted those down -- just as good the second time.
Anna: Also, I feel like we need to give props to Tom T. Huang from the Dallas Morning News, who led a great panel and was funny, modest and talked about Harold and Kumar a whole bunch. While we're hugging people, I'm going to run across town and hug him. Or not, but I totally would.
Brantley: I think I was in the bar during that one.
Leslie: He was by far the most thoughtful storyteller I've ever heard.
Anna: And he kind of waded into the audience to keep everybody engaged, which I liked. He must be a great teacher. He had a lot to say about finding stories by going outside your comfort zone. As opposed to the "write what you know" bullshit we always hear.
Brantley: The theme of this year's conference was loosely about immersion journalism. Saturday night's keynote was Ted Conover. This is appropriate because Conover does immersion like nobody does immersion.
Anna: Newjack is the first immersion reporting book I ever read. I was 15 the first time I heard him speak. I had no idea what I was going to do with myself. It was pretty amazing to hear him again, ten years later.
Brantley: For the uninitiated, Newjack is immersion in its purest form.
Anna: The man became a prison guard at Sing Sing to write a book about it.
Brantley: He worked for a solid year as a prison guard in Sing Sing. As he told the audience, his first impulse had been to find a way into the other side of the bars.
Leslie: Short of committing a crime to get in, this was the clearest method. So, notebook in breast pocket, he went to work and couldn't even tell friends what he was doing.
Brantley: Pretty much just his wife and his editor. Conover is one of those speakers who can simply get up on the stage and tell war stories, and we'll all sit rapt.
Leslie: True, and that's saying something because the panels tend to take a while. It's kind of the same reaction from the audience when Brantley sings karaoke.
Anna: Which he did at Mayborn!
Brantley: Ma, ma, ma, My Sharona! Is that even how you spell that? [Editor's note: Yes, Brantley.]
Anna: More importantly, when Brantley sings karaoke, he fucking commits. Wholeheartedly. He and Paul Knight from Texas Monthly tore it up.
Brantley: Don't forget Dave Tarrant of the Morning News. Man was in it to win it.
Leslie: Got to respect that level of commitment.
Brantley: Microphones were swung, much to the dismay of the karaoke DJ.
Leslie: The Backstreet Boys don't sing solos.