October 2024
Tuesday, 10/1
Wednesday, 10/2
Thursday, 10/3
Friday, 10/4
Saturday, 10/5
Sunday, 10/6
Monday, 10/7
Tuesday, 10/8
Bruce Andrews & Sally Silvers
Brodsky Gallery event
6:00 PM in person
rsvp: register here to attend in person
This performance and discussion coincides with a Brodsky Gallery installation of work from Upstage (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2024), a book in which words by Bruce Andrews and visuals by Sally Silvers combine to explore distinctive looks, textures, and language of pandemic-era Asbury Park, NJ.
Poet, performance writer, poetics theorist, sound designer, & retired social scientist, Bruce Andrews was born in Chicago, earned a BA and MA from Johns Hopkins, and a PhD from Harvard. He moved to New York City in 1975, where he taught Political Science & Political Economy at Fordham in the Bronx (specializing in U.S. imperialism, global capitalism, covert activity, cultural studies & the JFK assassination) for the next 37 years. Closely associated with the post-1970s experimental literary movement, so-called Language Poetry, he coedited the poetics journal L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E with Charles Bernstein. He has published 30+ books including Edge, Film Noir, Wobbling R + B, Love Songs, Give Em Enough Rope, Getting Ready to Have Been Frightened), I Don’t Have Any Paper So Shut up, or Social Romanticism, Tizzy Boost, EX WHY ZEE, Lip Service, Designated Heartbeat, Swoon Noir, You Can’t Have Everything… Where Would You Put It!, A Change Is Gonna Come, & The L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E Letters: Selected 1970s Correspondence of Bruce Andrews, Charles Bernstein, and Ron Silliman. His essays on literary theory & poetics are collected in Paradise & Method: Poetics & Praxis. Long involved in collaborative multi-media projects — including the performance group Barking (started with Sally Silvers & Tom Cora), staging large cast theater/performance spectacles in the 1980s — for decades he has been Sally Silvers Dancers’ main music/sound collaborator — composer,sound designer, & improvising music mixes & editing texts live in performance.
Sally Silvers is an award winning choreographer who also has published articles, essays, and poems in magazines, chapbooks, journals and anthologies. She continues to have an on-going fascination with the poetic as well as the social meanings of movement, offering a no-holds- barred exploration of movement possibilities often tilted toward the eccentric, awkward, and unexpected. Silvers has performed in South Korea, London, Puerto Rico, France, Mexico, Berlin, Sweden, and Denmark, at the Joyce Theater, and many other national and international venues. She was a core member of the faculty at Bennington College Summer Choreography Project for 5 years and a guest teacher at the European Dance Development Center in Holland for a decade. She is the co-director of 2 award-winning dance films & is known for several community curatorial projects including TalkTalkWalkWalk (combining dance artists and poets) and Surprise Every Time (a festival of “live choreography’ – starting a new dance live in front of the audience on the spot).. From 2005 to 2011 she danced in the new and historical works of Yvonne Rainer. She has been collaborating with poet/writer/sound designer Bruce Andrews since the early 1980s. For more information visit SallySilversDance.com.
Wednesday, 10/9
SPEAKEASY OPEN MIC NIGHT
Poetry, prose, anything goes
7:00 PM in person
rsvp:
register here to attend in person
Our student-run open mic night welcomes all kinds of readings, performances, spectacles, and happenings. You’ll have three minutes at the podium to perform. Bring your poetry, your guitar, your dance troupe, your award-winning essay, or your flash fiction to share.
Thursday, 10/10
Cartoonists Tara Booth and Caroline Cash
Bernheimer Syhmposium
6:00 PM in person
hosted by: Alli Katz
rsvp: register here to attend
Tara Booth is an Ignatz Award-winning cartoonist, painter, and illustrator from Philadelphia. Her autobiographical comics tackle issues related to mental health, addiction, gender, and sexuality. Known for her painterly approach to comics, often using bright colors and dizzying patterns, Tara’s work has been featured in Best American Comics, The New York Times, Vice, and Bloomberg Businessweek, among others.
Caroline Cash is a cartoonist from Charleston, South Carolina. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, VICE, MoMA Magazine, The Nib, and various other publications. She is currently working on her ongoing Eisner and Ignatz award-winning series PeePeePooPoo with Silver Sprocket, as well as an Untitled project with Drawn and Quarterly. She is a Capricorn.
Friday, 10/11
Saturday, 10/12
Sunday, 10/13
Monday, 10/14
A meeting of the writers house planning committee
5:30 PM in person
rsvp: register here to attend in person
Join us for a meeting of the Writers House Planning Committee (also known as "the Hub") — the core group of engaged students, staff, faculty, 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, 10/15
Zilka Joseph: reading and conversation
Sweet Malida: Memories of a Bene Israel Woman
12:00 PM in person
hosted by: Peter Decherney
co-sponsored by: Cinema & Media Studies and the Wexler Family Fund for Programs in Jewish Life and Culture
rsvp: register here to attend in person
Zilka Joseph is an internationally published poet who has authored six collections. Her work is influenced by Indian and Western cultures, and her Bene Israel roots, and has appeared in journals such as Poetry Magazine, Kenyon Review Online, Asian Literary Review, The Bombay Literary Magazine. She was nominated for PEN and Pushcart awards, been interviewed on NPR/Michigan Radio, and Rattlecast, Rivkush, and Culturico podcasts. The University of Michigan awarded her a Zell Fellowship, the Michael Gutterman prize, and the Elsie Choy Lee Scholarship. Her book Sparrows and Dust won a Notable Best Indie Book award. Sharp Blue Search of Flame and In Our Beautiful Bones were Foreword INDIES finalists. Sweet Malida: Memories of a Bene Israel Woman, was published in the US in February, and will be published in India in November, 2024. She is a creative writing coach, manuscript advisor, and a mentor to writers in her community. www.zilkajoseph.com
On Dictée
Julia Bloch, Laynie Browne, Elizabeth Kim, Jena Osman, Syd Zolf, and moderator Jo Park
5:30 PM in person
rsvp: register here to attend in person
Join us for an appreciation of Theresa Hak Kyung Cha's Dictée. Jo Park will host a gathering of local poets and scholars — Julia Bloch, Laynie Browne, Elizabeth Kim, Jena Osman, and Syd Zolf — who will each riff on a single passage from Cha's epic. Let's see where our improvisations take us, and we'll invite you to add yours!
Julia Bloch is the author of Lyric Trade: Reading the Subject in the Postwar Long Poem and three books of poetry, including Letters to Kelly Clarkson. She is a recipient of a Pew Fellowship in the Arts and director of the Creative Writing Program at the University of Pennsylvania.
Laynie Browne's recent books include: Everyone & Her Resemblances, Practice Has No Sequel, Intaglio Daughters, and Letters Inscribed in Snow. She edited the anthology A Forest on Many Stems: Essays on The Poet’s Novel and co-edited I'll Drown My Book: Conceptual Writing by Women. Honors include a Pew Fellowship and the National Poetry Series Award. She teaches and coordinates the MOOC Modern Poetry at University of Pennsylvania.
Elizabeth Kim is an Assistant Professor of English at Haverford College. She earned her PhD in English Literature from Temple University and her MFA in Poetry from the Creative Writing Program at Rutgers University-Newark. Her article, “‘Crammed with Tongues’: Cosmopolitan Creole in Cathy Park Hong’s Dance Dance Revolution” is forthcoming in College Literature. Her poetry and prose have appeared in Platform Review, The Stillwater Review, The Waiting Room Reader, and American Book Review.
Josephine Nock-Hee Park is School of Arts and Sciences President’s Distinguished Professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania, where she serves on the Steering Committee of the Asian American Studies Program and the Executive Committee of the James Joo-Jin Kim Center for Korean Studies. Her books include Apparitions of Asia: Modernist Form and Asian American Poetics (Oxford, 2008) and Cold War Friendships: Korea, Vietnam, and Asian American Literature (Oxford, 2016), and her most recent title is Theresa Hak Kyung Cha in Black and White (Cambridge Elements, 2023).
Jena Osman's latest book is A Very Large Array: Selected Poems. She often teaches Dictee to students in her Documentary Poetics classes at Temple University.
Syd Zolf’s interdisciplinary practice queerly enacts how ethics founders on the shoals of the political, imagining other possibilities of sociality, space, and time. They have published five books of poetry, including Janey’s Arcadia, Neighbour Procedure, and Human Resources; and a selected poetry, Social Poesis. Honors include a Pew Fellowship in the Arts, a Trillium Book Award for Poetry, several major grants, and finalist for several other prizes, including two Lambda Literary Awards. Zolf’s art films have screened at venues such as the International Film Festival Rotterdam and White Cube Bermondsey. Their theoretical text, No One’s Witness: A Monstrous Poetics (Duke, 2021) was a finalist for the 2022 Pegasus Award for Poetry Criticism. Zolf teaches at the University of Pennsylvania.
Wednesday, 10/16
Thursday, 10/17
Grad Student Open Mic Night
hosted by: the Graduate Student Center
6:00 PM - 8:00 PM in person
rsvp: register here to attend in person
Calling all graduate and professional student poets, authors, and writers! Come join your fellow students for a night of creativity and inspiration at the Kelly Writers House. Sign up to perform in advance or add your name during the event. A reception will be provided.
Friday, 10/18
Saturday, 10/19
Sunday, 10/20
Monday, 10/21
A conversation with Mirin Fader
Author of Dream: The Life and Legacy of Hakeem Olajuwon
6:00 PM in person
hosted by: Jamie-Lee Josselyn
rsvp: register here to attend in person
Jamie-Lee Josselyn, who teaches a popular Penn course about sports narratives, will host a conversation with sportswriter Mirin Fader, author of Dream, the definitive biography of pioneering international basketball superstar Hakeem Olajuwon. In Dream, Fader explores Olajuwon's life and legacy, including his ongoing work with NBA Africa, his status as an international ambassador for the game, and his consultations with today’s brightest stars, from LeBron James to Giannis Antetokounmpo. The book brings the story right up to the present moment, and beyond. Synthesizing hundreds of interviews and in-depth research, Fader provides the definitive biography of Olajuwon as well as a crucial understanding of his pivotal impact on the ever-shifting game.
Mirin Fader is a senior staff writer for The Ringer. Her first book, Giannis: The Improbable Rise of an NBA Champion, was a New York Times Bestseller, Los Angeles Times Bestseller, Wall Street Journal Bestseller, USA Today Bestseller, Publishers Weekly Bestseller. She has profiled some of the NBA’s biggest stars, including Giannis Antetokounmpo, Ja Morant, DeMar DeRozan, and LaMelo Ball, telling the backstories that have shaped some of our most complex, most dominant, heroes. Fader wrote for Bleacher Report from 2017 to 2020 and the Orange County Register from 2013 to 2017. Her work has been featured in the “Best American Sports Writing” series and honored by the Pro Basketball Writers Association, the Associated Press Sports Editors, the U.S. Basketball Writers Association, the Football Writers Association of America, and the Los Angeles Press Club. She lives in Los Angeles.
Tuesday, 10/22
Debut Authors in Horror, Romance, Historical Fiction, & More
12:00 PM in person
sponsored by: the Creative Writing Program
hosted by: Kitsi Watterson
rsvp: register here to attend in person
Navigating the publishing world as a debut author can be by turns exciting, confusing, joyful, and scary. Four Philadelphia-area 2024 debut authors will discuss their journeys to publication, their experiences as debuts, and the finer points of craft across a genre kaleidoscope of fiction and nonfiction. Moderated by Penn faculty and award-winning writer and journalist Kathryn "Kitsi" Watterson.
Ashton Lattimore is an author, award-winning journalist and former lawyer. Her debut historical fiction novel, All We Were Promised (Ballantine Books), was released in April 2024. By day, she is the editor-in-chief at Prism, a nonprofit news outlet whose work centers on communities of color. Her nonfiction writing has also appeared in the Washington Post, Slate, CNN, and Essence. She is a graduate of Harvard College, Columbia Journalism School, and Harvard Law School, where she was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. A New Jersey native, Ashton now lives in suburban Philadelphia with her husband and two sons.
Laura Piper Lee writes adult romantic comedies. Her debut novel, Hannah Tate, Beyond Repair released in February 2024 in the U.S. and in the U.K. from Union Square & Co. It was named One of the Best New Rom-Com Books of 2024 by Brit & Co and One of the Best (and Most Anticipated) Romance Books of 2024 by Elle magazine. She is currently working on her second novel, Zoe Brennan, First Crush, which is set to release in February 2025, also from Union Square & Co. Laura also writes fantasy and science fiction novels for children, and when she is not writing, works as an education policy attorney for school districts, colleges, and universities.
Karen Tang, MD, MPH Dr. Karen Tang is a board-certified gynecologist and minimally invasive gynecologic surgeon, and an internationally recognized leader in reproductive health; as @KarenTangMD on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube, she reaches millions of viewers each month with her educational videos about period health, pelvic pain, and reproductive rights. Her book It's Not Hysteria, came out from Flatiron Books in May 2024. She lives in the Philadelphia area with her husband and three children.
NICOLE M. WOLVERTON is the author of the young adult horror novel A Misfortune of Lake Monsters (CamCat Books, released July 2024). Her short fiction and creative nonfiction have been published in the Saturday Evening Post, Aji magazine, and the Nighty Night podcast with Rabia Chaudry, among others, and she served as editor of the 2021 anthology Bodies Full of Burning (Sliced Up Press). She is the assistant editor of Penn Nursing Magazine and a 2023 graduate of Penn's Masters of Liberal Arts program, with a degree in horror and storytelling.
Laynie Browne: On the Way to The Filmic Woods
A poetry reading and Brodsky Gallery Opening
6:00 PM in person
curated by: Lila Shermeta
rsvp: register here to attend in person
Laynie Browne, Sister Abdomen, 2021
Join us for a reading and art opening with Laynie Browne for her new collage show "On the Way to The Filmic Woods." About her process, Browne writes: “When words grow weary I sit on the floor with collage. What if each day I were to construct an image of the figure I am to inhabit, and then set out as this image? Last night the fox ran across my yard three times within an hour, always from the left corner to the right, along the back perimeter. I move through pages inscribing with a similar concentration. In scraps of disassembled paper I searched for a way to exit habit — filling in, from left to right and top to bottom. How else to remember the one not reliant on any circumstance? I found myself lost in a passage I must simultaneously recognize and disown. If only it were as easy as getting dressed and undressed.”
Laynie Browne's recent books include Everyone & Her Resemblances (Pamenar, 2024), Intaglio Daughters (Ornithopter, 2023), Practice Has No Sequel (Pamenar), Letters Inscribed in Snow (Tinderbox Editions, 2023), and the anthology A Forest on Many Stems: Essays on the Poet's Novel (Nightboat, 2021). Forthcoming books include Apprentice to a Breathing Hand (Omnidawn, 2025). Honors include a Pew Fellowship, the National Poetry Series Award, and the Contemporary Poetry Series Award. She teaches and coordinates the MOOC Modern and Contemporary Poetry at the University of Pennsylvania.
Wednesday, 10/23
Edible Books Party
5:30 PM in person
rsvp: register here to enter the contest
sponsored by: the Blaze Fund
Anyone is welcome to make, bake, or build an (edible) book and bring it to our annual Edible Books Party for judging and consumption. Prizes will be awarded in a number of categories, including Punniest, Best Use of a Single Ingredient, Most Literary, and the Blaziest (i.e. the best). Sign up here
An “edible book” can be many things. You might bake a cake and decorate it to look like your favorite book. You might think of a food-based pun and go from there. Past entries have included Jane Pear, 50 Cups of Earl Grey, Infinite Pesto.). We've had flan jokes and pie jokes. We've had glorious towers. You can make a book solo or as a team! This event is held each year in loving memory of Blaze Bernstein.
Thursday, 10/24
Fashion: A Political Statement
featuring fashion writer Rachel Tashjian
Povich Journalism Program
5:30 PM in person
hosted by: Anthony DeCurtis
rsvp: register here to attend in person
Rachel Tashjian is a fashion writer for The Washington Post's Style section, covering fashion and style on the runway, red carpet and street, and in the media and politics. She is also the creator of Opulent Tips, an "invitation-only" newsletter with a cult following providing shopping and personal style advice. Previously, she was the fashion news director at Harper's Bazaar, where she profiled leading designers including Miuccia Prada, Maria Grazia Chiuri of Dior and Nicolas Ghesquière of Louis Vuitton. She was a 2023 ASME nominee for her reviews and criticism. Before that, she was GQ's Q's first fashion critic, writing about the evolution of streetwear and the fashion diplomacy of the Bidens, the Trump administration and the British royals. She has written for Artforum, Bookforum and New York Magazine.
Friday, 10/25
Saturday, 10/26
Sunday, 10/27
Monday, 10/28
Live at the Writers house
a monthly radio show produced in collaboration with WXPN
6:30 PM in person
rsvp: register here to attend in person
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 records a one-hour show of poetry, music, and other spoken-word art for broadcast by WXPN. LIVE at the Writers House is edited by Zach Carduner and produced by Alli Katz. The show is made possible through the generous support of BigRoc.
Tuesday, 10/29
Chef to Chef
Brooks Headley of Superiority Burger in conversation with Gabrielle Hamilton of Prune
6:00 PM in person
rsvp: register here to attend in person
Brooks Headley opened the original location of Superiority
Burger in the East Village of New York City in June of 2015. Previously he worked as a
pastry chef at a bunch of different fine dining restaurants in DC, New York, and Los
Angeles, including Del Posto where he won the James Beard Award for Outstanding Pastry
Chef. He has written two cookbooks, Fancy Desserts and Superiority Burger Cookbook. Since opening the new location of
Superiority Burger in 2023, Superiority Burger has received outstanding reviews including
three stars from the New York Times and a Michelin Bib
Gourmand. Headley was named one of Time's Top 100 Most Influential People of 2024.
Gabrielle Hamilton is the chef/owner of Prune restaurant in New York's East Village and the author of the New York Times bestselling memoir Blood, Bones & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef. Hamilton received an MFA in fiction writing from the University of Michigan, and her work has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, GQ, Bon Appétit, Saveur, House Beautiful, and Food & Wine. Her work has been anthologized in eight volumes of Best Food Writing and she most recently was a monthly Eat columnist at the New York Times Magazine. She has appeared on television on numerous shows, winning an Emmy for her season of Netflix's "Mind of a Chef." She has won four James Beard Foundation Awards, including for Best Chef NYC, and Outstanding Chef in the country. Hamilton teaches in Penn's Creative Writing Program.
Wednesday, 10/30
Thursday, 10/31
Democracy as Creative Practice: A Collaborative Conversation
12:00 PM in person
co-sponsored by: the Creative Writing Program, the Sachs Program for Arts Innovation, and #VoteThatJawn
rsvp: register here to attend in person
Join us for a collaborative conversation inspired by the new anthology Democracy as Creative Practice: Weaving a Culture of Civic Life, a collection of essays by artists and cultural activists exploring the connection between theater, performance art, dance, and literature, and the bolstering of democracy through voter engagement, community development, collective healing, and dialogue across differences. Democracy as Creative Practice is home to essays by thirty-five contributors representing seven countries; for this event, co-editor Andrew Zitcer will be joined by three Philadelphia-based artists from the anthology, in conversation with Julia Bloch and students.
Andrew Zitcer is Associate Professor at Drexel University in Philadelphia, where he directs the Urban Strategy graduate program.
Lisa Jo Epstein PhD is Founder and Principal Artist-Facilitator-Educator and Consultant as well as Presence-Based Leadership Coach at Just Act in Philadelphia.
Kirsten Kaschock has been a member of Writers Room in Philadelphia since 2015 and is the author of five poetry books and a novel.
Rachel Wenrick is the founding director of Writers Room and executive director for arts and civic innovation at Drexel University in Philadelphia.