Center Stage
(On S. Dearborn St. in Printers Row Park between Polk and Harrison Streets, West Side of Dearborn.)
Sunday 9/13, 12pm

James Stewart III is a Black writer and arts organizer from Chicago. His debut novel, Defiant Acts (Acre Books, 2025), is a winner of the 2025 Foreword INDIES Bronze Award for Multicultural Fiction, as well as a 2026 Friends of American Writers Literature Award recipient. He was named to Newcity’s 2025 Lit 50 and the Guild Literary Complex’s 2026 “35 Writers to Watch.” His writing appears in Lampblack, The Forge, and Midwest Review. He co-founded Exhibit B, the reading series and artist collective, and teaches at Northwestern University.