Celebrate bestselling and award-winning author Jason Reynolds’s debut picture book along with the illustrators Jerome & Jarrett Pumphrey, all in conversation with award-wining author Jacqueline Woodson. There Was a Party for Langston is a snappy, joyous ode to Word King, literary genius, and glass-ceiling smasher Langston Hughes and the luminaries he inspired. Join us at the Langston Hughes Auditorium in the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in New York City.
Reynolds & the Pumphreys will discuss the inspiration behind and creation of their new book, discuss the significance of Hughes’s life, and take pictures with attendees. All books will be presigned (no personalization) and attendees will be able to take pictures with the author and illustrators.
Guests. Please note that holding seats in the Langston Hughes Auditorium is strictly prohibited and there is no food or drinks allowed anywhere in the Schomburg Center.
E-Transportation. NYPL policy prohibits electric transportation devices (e.g., motorbikes, e-bikes, e-scooters, e-skateboards) from being brought into or stored at library sites for any length of time, as this is the best way to keep our spaces & people safe.
Audio & Video Recording. Programs are photographed and recorded by the Schomburg Center. Attending this event indicates your consent to being filmed/photographed and your consent to the use of your recorded image for any all purposes of the New York Public Library.
Press. Please send all press inquiries (photo, video, interviews, audio-recording, etc) at least 24-hours before the day of the program to Leah Drayton, leahdrayton@nypl.org. Please note that professional video recordings are prohibited without expressed consent.
Public Notice & Disclaimer. By registering for this event, you are acknowledging that an inherent risk of exposure to COVID-19 exists in any public place where people are present. By attending an in-person program at The New York Public Library’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, you voluntarily assume all risks related to exposure to COVID-19 and agree not to hold The New York Public Library, its Trustees, officers, agent and employees liable for any illness or injury. If you have symptoms consistent with COVID-19 or suspect you have been in close contact with someone who has tested positive, please stay home.
Accessibility. There is an electric door switch at the front door. All parts of the collections and the public restrooms are accessible to persons using wheelchairs.Programs and events at the Langston Hughes Auditorium and Atrium are accessible for people using wheelchairs.There are accessible restrooms for women and for men.
Getting there. Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture is located at 515 Malcolm X Blvd, New York, NY 10037 between 135th St. and 136th St. The 2 and 3 train stops are located at 135th St. The M7 and M102 stops at Malcolm X Blvd/W 135 St. and the Bx33 stops on W 135 St/Malcolm X Blvd. You may also take the C or B train to 135th St. and walk 3 blocks east.
This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council. Word Up Community Bookshop’s programs are made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.
Jason Reynolds is a #1 New York Times bestselling author, a Newbery Award Honoree, a Printz Award Honoree, a two-time National Book Award finalist, a Kirkus Award winner, a UK Carnegie Medal winner, a two-time Walter Dean Myers Award winner, an NAACP Image Award Winner, an Odyssey Award Winner and two-time honoree, the recipient of multiple Coretta Scott King honors, and the Margaret A. Edwards Award. He was also the 2020–2022 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. His many books include All American Boys (cowritten with Brendan Kiely); When I Was the Greatest; The Boy in the Black Suit; Stamped; As Brave as You; For Every One; the Track series (Ghost, Patina, Sunny, and Lu); Look Both Ways; Stuntboy, in the Meantime; Ain’t Burned All the Bright (recipient of the Caldecott Honor) and My Name Is Jason. Mine Too. (both cowritten with Jason Griffin); and Long Way Down, which received a Newbery Honor, a Printz Honor, and a Coretta Scott King Honor. He lives in Washington, DC. You can find his ramblings at JasonWritesBooks.com.
Jerome Pumphrey is a designer, illustrator, and writer, originally from Houston, Texas. His work includes It’s a Sign!, Somewhere in the Bayou, The Old Boat, and The Old Truck, which received seven starred reviews, was named a Best Book of the Year by Publishers Weekly and received the Ezra Jack Keats Writer Award Honor—all of which he created with his brother Jarrett. They also illustrated Jason Reynolds’s There Was a Party for Langston. Jerome works as a graphic designer at The Walt Disney Company.
Jarrett Pumphrey is an award-winning author-illustrator who makes books for kids with his brother, Jerome. Their books include It’s a Sign!, Somewhere in the Bayou, The Old Boat, and The Old Truck, which received seven starred reviews, was named a Best Book of the Year by Publishers Weekly and received the Ezra Jack Keats Writer Award Honor. They also illustrated Jason Reynolds’s There Was a Party for Langston.
Jacqueline Woodson received a 2023 Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, 2020 MacArthur Fellowship, the 2020 Hans Christian Andersen Award, the 2018 Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award, and the 2018 Children’s Literature Legacy Award, and she was the 2018–2019 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. Her NY Times bestselling memoir, Brown Girl Dreaming, won the National Book Award, the Coretta Scott King Award, a Newbery Honor, and the NAACP Image Award. Her dozens of books for young readers include Coretta Scott King Award and NAACP Image Award winner Before the Ever After, NY Times bestsellers The Day You Begin and Harbor Me, Newbery Honor winners Feathers, Show Way, and After Tupac and D Foster, and Each Kindness, which won the Jane Addams Children’s Book Award.
