Litquake comes of age, ready for its 18th year

Litquake runs Oct. 6-14. Litquake runs Oct. 6-14. Photo: Litquake Photo: Litquake Image 1 of / 3 Caption Close Litquake comes of age, ready for its 18th year 1 / 3 Back to Gallery

Litquake has officially grown up.

The Bay Area’s oldest literary festival turns 18 this year and, appropriately enough, it’ll take up some weighty issues during its nine-day run, from Oct. 6-14.

Social activism, protest and global warming are a few of the topics that will be explored at the festival’s panels. The man who inspired such programming will be the subject of one event, titled “Parsing the President: Experts Discuss the Behavior of Donald J. Trump.” Three panelists, joined by moderator David Talbot, will have the challenge of bringing clarity to that much-discussed matter in just two hours; they are comedian Will Durst, psychiatrist and activist Dee Mosbacher, and linguist Geoffrey Nunberg. To give you an idea of where the conversation might lead, consider what Nunberg wrote in his book “Ascent of the A-Word” way back in 2012: “Trump is a pure —hole in a way that very few people are ever a pure anything.”

Those looking for a break from talk of totalitarianism, rising seas and the threat of nuclear war will have plenty of less somber fare to partake of at Litquake, which will showcase roughly 600 authors. The psychological benefits of surfing, for example, will be celebrated — at Mollusk Surf Shop & Gallery — by authors Aaron James (“Surfing with Sartre: An Aquatic Inquiry into a Life of Meaning”) and Jaimal Yogis (“All Our Waves Are Water: Stumbling Toward Enlightenment and the Perfect Ride”).

Meantime, at the Center for Sex and Culture, sexologist Carol Queen will be in conversation with Lynn Comella, author of “Vibrator Nation: How Feminist Sex-Toy Stores Changed the Business of Pleasure.” A “Barbary Coast Prostitute Walking Tour” — led by Ivy Anderson and Devon Angus, authors of “Alice: Memoirs of a Barbary Coast Prostitute” — will explore vice districts of old San Francisco.

Poetry, too, will be the highlight of numerous events, including readings at Alley Cat Books in the Mission District, Yerba Buena Gardens, the Museum of the African Diaspora and Grace Cathedral.

And it wouldn’t be Litquake without the annual closing-night Lit Crawl, the roving party that takes over the Mission. It all begins at 5 p.m.

For a full schedule, go to www.litquake.org

John McMurtrie is The San Francisco Chronicle’s book editor. Email: jmcmurtrie@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @McMurtrieSF