Osha interviews Lesley Bannatyne, award winning author and world expert on Halloween, from Cambridge, Massachusetts. We’ll talk about creativity, writing, She-Boom post-menopausal drum group, mime, in situ- theater and performance art.
Lesley Bannatyne’s fiction and essays have been published in the Boston Globe, Smithsonian, Christian Science Monitor, and Craft, Zone 3, Pangyrus, Shooter, and Bosque Literary Magazines. She won the 2019 Tucson Festival of Books Literary Award, 2018 Bosque fiction prize, and her story, “OMG! Winn Handler Moved Next Door,” was awarded third place in the 2021 Tennessee Williams Literary Festival.
As a freelance journalist, Lesley covered stories ranging from druids in Massachusetts to relief workers in Bolivia. She writes extensively on Halloween, especially its history, literature, and contemporary celebration, and her most recent non-fiction book, Halloween Nation. Behind the Scenes of America’s Fright Night was a finalist for the Bram Stoker award.
Lesley is recently retired from Harvard University’s Music Department.