March 2018
Thursday, 3/1
Friday, 3/2
Saturday, 3/3
Sunday, 3/4
Monday, 3/5
Tuesday, 3/6
Wednesday, 3/7
Thursday, 3/8
Friday, 3/9
Saturday, 3/10
Sunday, 3/11
Monday, 3/12
Hub Meeting
5:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
rsvp: jalowent@writing.upenn.edu
Join us for a meeting of the Hub, the core of engaged faculty, students, staff, and volunteers who help make things happen at Writers House. Anyone is welcome to become a Hub member by participating in Hub activities and helping out. Members of the Hub plan programs, share ideas, and discuss upcoming projects.
Tuesday, 3/13
Lunch with Sara Nović
12:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
rsvp: wh@writing.upenn.edu or 215-573-9748
co-sponsored by: The Creative Writing Program
hosted by: Beth Kephart
Sara Nović is the author of the novel Girl at War (Random House), which was a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize, an American Library Association Alex Award Winner, and has been translated into 13 languages. She is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Stockton University and lives in Philadelphia.
ASL interpretation will be provided.
A Poetry reading by Michael Palmer
Sussman Poetry Program
6:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
watch: a video recording of this event via KWH-TV: part 1, part 2
listen to an audio recording of this event
Poet and translator Michael Palmer has lived in San Francisco since 1969. He has worked with the Margaret Jenkins Dance Company for over forty years and has collaborated with many composers and visual artists. His most recent collections are Active Boundaries (Selected Essays and Talks), (New Directions, 2008), Madman With Broom (selected poems with Chinese translations by Yunte Huang, Oxford University Press, 2011), and Thread, (New Directions, 2011). His new book of poems, The Laughter of the Sphinx, was published by New Directions in June of 2016. He has taught at various universities in the United States, Europe and Asia, and in May of 2012 received the Arts and Letters Prize in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Previously, among other awards, he received the Shelley Memorial Prize from the Poetry Society of America, a Lila Wallace – Readers Digest Foundation Grant for the years 1992-94, the Wallace Stevens Prize from the Academy of American Poets, two National Endowment for the Arts fellowships and a Guggenheim Fellowship. From 1999 to 2004 he was a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. His work has been translated into over thirty languages, and he himself has translated poems and prose, principally from French, Brazilian Portuguese and Russian.
Wednesday, 3/14
SCIENCE / FICTION
Brodsky Gallery Opening for "We are Here," works by Kaitlin Moore
6:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
Co-curated by Kaitlin Moore and Connie Yu
watch: a video recording of this event via KWH-TV: part 1, part 2
listen to an audio recording of this event
Brodsky Gallery show "We Are Here" will feature works of wide field astrophotography from University of Pennsylvania senior Kaitlin Moore. The show will open with SCIENCE / FICTION, a discussion – moderated by the artist – between writers, scientists, and scholars on how to work among similar concepts through different means.
Earth lies about a third of the way along one of the vast spiral arms of dust and light and that compose the Milky Way Galaxy. Estimated to be some 100,000 light-years wide and 1,000 light-years thick, the Milky Way contains more than a thousand million stars. To photograph these celestial bodies, to peer back through time and see them as they were millions of years ago, is to glimpse some ancient core of understanding. Astrophotography is an attempt at grasping the workings of the universe, to peer further and to find something more beyond our world's fretful compass. The practice allows us to point to a starscape and proclaim simply: we are here.
This show and program are co-curated by Kaitlin Moore and Connie Yu.
Kaitlin Moore is a time traveller, tourist, and newly discovered cryptid. Combining an inexplicable love of physics with a stubborn attachment to writing, Kaitlin crafts (with varying degrees of success) stories that experiment with time, space, and superpositive cats that are both alive and dead. She is the author of four novels, and her works of short fiction, poetry, and photography have appeared in Mad Scientist Journal, Stylus, Supplement, Tinge, and others. She just wants to take a nap.
Thursday, 3/15
Here, There and Everywhere: Jeffrey Gaines on the Beatles
RealArts@Penn program
5:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
hosted by Anthony DeCurtis
watch: a video recording of this event via KWH-TV
listen: to an audio recording of this event
The inimitable Anthony DeCurtis, who is teaching a Beatles seminar this spring, will interview singer-songwriter-guitarist Jeffrey Gaines, a charismatic performer who regards the Beatles as a decisive influence on both his music and his life. Gaines will play Beatles songs, as well as his own material. Gaines's version of Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes" was memorably used in Cameron Crowe's film Say Anything, and his compelling new album Alrightjust came out. As Sgt. Pepper promised, "A pleasant time is guaranteed for all."
Throughout his two-and-a-half-decade recording career, JEFFREY GAINES has maintained an impressive standard for soul-searching, introspective lyrics and catchy, uplifting melodies. Since bursting on the scene with his self-titled 1992 debut album, the charismatic musician has built a beloved body of recordings that's won him a large and deeply devoted international fan base. Now, after an extended absence from the recording studio, Gaines returns with Alright, his first Omnivore Recordings release and his first set of new studio material since 2003's Toward the Sun. The new album features ten irresistible examples of the Philadelphia-based artist's personally charged songcraft, performed with the same effortless exuberance that's long been a hallmark of Gaines' artful recordings and his dazzling live performances.
Recorded in Los Angeles with producer/multi-instrumentalist Chris Price (whose production resume includes acclaimed recent comeback efforts by Emitt Rhodes and Linda Perhacs, as well as his own widely celebrated second solo effort, Stop Talking), Alright features an all-star studio band consisting of guitarist Val McCallum (Jackson Browne, Sheryl Crow, Lucinda Williams), bassist Davey Faragher (Elvis Costello, Cracker, John Hiatt), and drummer Pete Thomas (Elvis Costello, Squeeze, Elliott Smith), who also record on their own as Jackshit.
Friday, 3/16
Saturday, 3/17
Sunday, 3/18
Monday, 3/19
LIVE at the Writers House
7:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
LIVE at the Writers House is a long-standing collaboration of the people of the Kelly Writers House and of WXPN (88.5 FM). Six times annually between September and April, the Writers House airs a one-hour broadcast of poetry, music, and other spoken-word art, along with one musical guest -- from our Arts Cafe onto the airwaves at WXPN. "LIVE" is broadcast on WXPN. "LIVE" is made possible through the generous support of BigRoc and is produced by Alli Katz.
Tuesday, 3/20
A conversation with poet Sally Van Doren
hosted by Al Filreis
12:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
rsvp: wh@writing.upenn.edu or call (215) 746-POEM
watch: a video recording of this event via KWH-TV: part 1, part 2
listen to an audio recording of this event
Sally Van Doren, poet and artist, is the author of three poetry collections, Promise, (LSU Press 2017) Possessive, (2012) and Sex at Noon Taxes (2008) which received the Walt Whitman Award from the Academy of American Poets. She has taught at the 92nd Street Y in New York City, Washington University and in the St. Louis Public schools. A curator for the St. Louis Poetry Center, she posts daily excerpts from her ongoing poem, The Sense Series, via Instagram @sallyvandoren.
A performance by Gabriel Ramirez, with Kassidi Jones
Caroline Rothstein Oral Poetry Program
6:30 PM in the Arts Cafe
Introduced by: Imani Davis
watch: a video recording of this event via KWH-TV: part 1, part 2
listen to an audio recording
of this event
Gabriel Ramirez is a writer, poet, playwright, educator, and activist. He is the 2012 Knicks Poetry Slam Champion and a member of the 2012 Urban Word NYC slam team. Featured in an off-broadway production of Black Ink he debuted Sankofa a one-man show he wrote and acted in himself, collaborating with award winning choreographer and director, Nicco Annan. Gabriel has performed on Broadway at the New Amsterdam Theatre, United Nations, New York Live Arts, Lincoln Center, Apollo Theatre and other venues & universities around the nation. He has also been featured in the Huffington Post, Vibe Magazine, Blavity, Upworthy and at a TEDxYouth Conference. Gabriel ranked 2nd in New York City in Youth Slam and won the 2013 National Poetry Youth Slam Championship in Boston and has gone on to represent New York City at the National Poetry Slam festival on teams ranking top 10 in 2014 and 2015.
Wednesday, 3/21
Lunch with poet Susan M. Schultz
hosted by Al Filreis
12:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
rsvp: wh@writing.upenn.edu or call (215) 746-POEM
This event CANCELED due to inclement weather.
Susan M. Schultz is author of several volumes about memory and two others about forgetting. Most recently, Memory Cards: Thomas Traherne Series came out from Talisman Press (2016) and Memory Cards: Simone Weil Series from Equipage in the UK (2017) . She also published two volumes of Dementia Blog with Singing Horse Press (2008, 2014). Her critical book, A Poetics of Impasse in Modern and Contemporary American Poetry, came out in the University of Alabama's Poetry and Poetics Series (2005). She founded Tinfish Press, which publishes experimental poetry from the Pacific region, in 1995, and lives on O`ahu with her family. She is a life-long St. Louis Cardinals fan.
Speakeasy Open Mic Night
7:30 PM in the Arts Cafe
This event CANCELED due to inclement weather.
Our student-run open mic night welcomes all kinds of readings, performances, spectacles, and happenings. Bring your poetry, your guitar, your dance troupe, your award-winning essay, or your stand up comedy to share.
Thursday, 3/22
A poetry reading by Tonya Foster
7:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
watch: a video recording of this event via KWH-TV
listen: to an audio recording of this event
Tonya M. Foster was raised in New Orleans. She is the author of the bilingual chapbook La Grammaire des Os and the poetry collection A Swarm of Bees in High Court, which Stephen Burt describes as "the long-delayed American apotheosis of haiku form." In a review, Patricia Spears Jones notes that "Foster's imaginative work glories in language's ambiguities, discords, emotions and logic—she allows that imaginative thrall to explore race and gender and political dysfunction." A coeditor of Third Mind: Creative Writing through Visual Art, Foster has had work published in Best American Experimental Writing (2016), boundary2, Litscapes: Collected US Writings 2015, Callaloo, MiPoesias, Western Humanities Review, the Hat, and elsewhere.
Foster has received fellowships from the Ford Foundation, the Mellon Foundation, the Graduate Center, CUNY, the New York Foundation for the Arts, the MacDowell Colony, the Pan African Literary Festival, and elsewhere. She teaches creative writing at the California College of the Arts.
Friday, 3/23
Saturday, 3/24
Sunday, 3/25
Monday, 3/26
Reading by Bernadette Mayer
Kelly Writers House Fellows Program
6:30 PM in the Arts Cafe
watch: a video recording of this event via PennSound
listen to an audio recording of this event
Bernadette Mayer is an
experimental poet, editor, and teacher associated with the New York
School writers. For decades her work has brought formal experimentalism
into the realm of the domestic by exploring, expanding and exploding
what "the domestic" even is. Mayer has also created much-adopted syllabi
and exercises to support the teaching of reading and writing, the best
known of these being her journal ideas and writing experiments. She
regularly taught workshops at St. Mark's Poetry Project in New York City
throughout the 70s, and from 1980 - 1984 served as the director. Mayer
was also a great publisher and editor of her contemporaries, through
0 to 9 co-edited with Vito Acconci, and United Artists Books and the
associated magazine from 1977 - 1983. She has published over 20 books of
poetry including Midwinter Day,
Sonnets, and most recently, Eating the
Colors of a Lineup of Words, a collection of her early books. In 2015
Mayer was named a Guggenheim Fellow.
RSVP REQUIRED: whfellow@writing.upenn.edu
Tuesday, 3/27
Brunch with Bernadette Mayer
Kelly Writers House Fellows Program
10:00 AM in the Arts Cafe
watch: a video recording of this event via PennSound
listen to an audio recording of this event
Bernadette Mayer is an
experimental poet, editor, and teacher associated with the New York
School writers. For decades her work has brought formal experimentalism
into the realm of the domestic by exploring, expanding and exploding
what "the domestic" even is. Mayer has also created much-adopted syllabi
and exercises to support the teaching of reading and writing, the best
known of these being her journal ideas and writing experiments. She
regularly taught workshops at St. Mark's Poetry Project in New York City
throughout the 70s, and from 1980 - 1984 served as the director. Mayer
was also a great publisher and editor of her contemporaries, through
0 to 9 co-edited with Vito Acconci, and United Artists Books and the
associated magazine from 1977 - 1983. She has published over 20 books of
poetry including Midwinter Day,
Sonnets, and most recently, Eating the
Colors of a Lineup of Words, a collection of her early books. In 2015
Mayer was named a Guggenheim Fellow.
RSVP REQUIRED: whfellow@writing.upenn.edu
Wednesday, 3/28
From Journalism to Show Biz: Adapting Nonfiction for Network TV
Lunch with Michael Sokolove
Povich Journalism Program
12:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
Hosted by: Dick Polman
rsvp: wh@writing.upenn.edu or call (215) 746-POEM
watch: a video recording of this event via KWH-TV: part 1, part 2
listen to an audio recording of this event
MICHAEL SOKOLOVE is the author of four books, including Drama High: The Incredible True Story of a Brilliant Teacher, a Struggling Town and the Magic of Theater, which has been adapted for an NBC prime-time show, Rise. Premiering March 13, Rise is executive produced by Jeffrey Seller, best known for the Broadway show Hamilton. Since 2001, Sokolove has been a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine, where he has written about the science, culture and sociology of sports, as well as politics and a broad range of other topics.
Thursday, 3/29
Lunch with Scott Gould
12:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
hosted by: Jamie-Lee Josselyn
RSVP: wh@writing.upenn.edu or (215) 746-POEM
watch: a video recording of this event via KWH-TV
listen: to an audio recording of this event
Scott Gould's work has appeared in Kenyon
Review, Carolina Quarterly, New Madrid Journal, The Bitter Southerner,
Black Warrior Review, Eclectica, The Raleigh Review, New Stories from
the South, and New Southern Harmonies, among others. His collection of
stories, Strangers to Temptation, was published by Hub City Press in
June, 2017. He is a two-time winner of the Artist Fellowship in Prose
from the South Carolina Arts Commission and a past winner of the Fiction
Fellowship from the South Carolina Academy of Authors. He currently
chairs the creative writing department at the South Carolina Governor's
School for the Arts & Humanities. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has
said of Strangers to Temptation, "Gould has produced a compulsive read.
His prose shines, and by linking these stories, as opposed to compiling
them in novel form, he highlights the very essence of coming of age, how
the myriad, sporadic events in a young life, serve as vital stepping
stones on the daunting and oftentimes imperfect journey to
adulthood."
7 Up on Blue
6:00 PM in the Arts Cafe
Seven speakers, seven minutes each, all about "blue." The 7 UP program is an annual event for which we invite seven people — reporters, scientists, field experts, musicians, anthropologists, lexicographers, and others — to speak for seven minutes each about a shared topic. Each speaker gives their insight on some aspect of the chosen theme; interesting interpretations and musings always result!
This year’s 7 Up on Blue will feature: