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All events take place at the Writers House, 3805 Locust Walk, Philadelphia (U of P).
Sunday, 12/1
- Thanksgiving break--house closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Monday, 12/2
- 8:00 PM: Live at the Writers House, hosts "Civic Culture - Art Culture - Philadelphia Culture Makers" a show
featruing Lise Funderburg, Greg Giovanni, Michael Barsanti, Bennett
Simpson, Beandrea Davis and musical guest Tara Burke. The one-hour word and music radio show
tapes at the Kelly Writers House and airs on 88.5 WXPN on December, 8th at 11 PM.
Bennett Simpson is associate curator at the Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania. Recent curatorial projects include: “Shoot the Singer: Music on Video” at ICA (2002); “Elysian Fields,” at the Centre Pompidou, Paris (2000); “The Production of Production,” co-curated with Tim Griffin at Apex Art, New York (1999). Simpson’s writing on art, music, and media has appeared in Artforum, Artext, Frieze, Texte zur Kunst, and Purple, where he is associate editor. In 2001-2002, Simpson held the Whitney-Lauder Curatorial Fellowship at ICA, Philadelphia, and is a graduate of the Whitney Museum’s Independent Study Program and the University of Virginia.
Beandrea Davis is a senior at the University of Pennsylvania double-majoring in Africana Studies and French. She is the student coordinator of Undergraduate Writing Advising at Penn and has been an advisor for the past 3 years. In the Spring of 2002 she studied in Paris and did an independent study on french hip-hop culture and youth of color in France. She enjoys doing youth organizing work, particularly with young women of color, which she has done in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. during the past four years. She was recently featured in the November issue of Essence Magazine as one of the winners of their Ten Incredible College Women contest. In the fall of 2003 she plans to start her first booklength project about the lives of young women in Bamako, Mali (West Africa). She is considering getting an MFA in creative writing with a concentration in creative non-fiction prose and plans to work as a writer and community organizer. She enjoys morning bike rides, kripalu yoga, and cooking. She is from Middletown, CT.
Lise Funderburg is an essayist, feature writer, and book critic based in Philadelphia. She graduated from Reed College and earned her masters at The Columbia University School of Journalism. Her first book is a collection of oral histories called "Black, White, Other: Biracial Americans Talk About Race and Identity," and she has contributed to numerous anthologies. She has written for The Nation, The New York Times Magazine, the Oprah Magazine, LIFE, TIME, and countless tiny literary journals.
Greg Giovanni has been presented at most of the major venues, galleries, nightclubs and warehouses in Philadelphia over the last dozen years. Most recently, he wrote and directed Naked Cocktail for Brat Productions in the 2001 Philadelphia Fringe Festival. While as Artistic Director and resident playwright of the old Big Mess Theatre. His plays include Napoleon Pullapart (Parts One though Five and a half), Lucy (an operetta), and The Bacchæ after Euripides. and The Ixiondae, a masque. He has also writes a one-person shows including Winners-hailed as "the most significant show in the (Philadelphia Fringe) Festival's three-year history" by the Philadelphia Weekly and Bloom's Fork Caberet for the Rosenbach museum and library. Working in other media, Giovanni produced a dance extravaganza; The Taking Tiger Mountain Lip Sync Show and a notorious spotlight for WHYY; "Medea of Springfield."
Michael Barsanti is the Associate Curator at the Rosenbach Museum & Library, where he works primarily with literary things. He has curated exhibitions and taught classes there on a wide variety of subjects, including portrait photography, wartime poetry, James Joyce manuscripts, and Shakespeare forgeries. He has recently completed his Ph.D. in English Literature at Penn, where he also occasionally teaches classes on modernism and writing.
Fursaxa is the musical project of Tara Burke. She usually plays solo, but has been accompanied live by other musicians, who play mostly guitar and percussion. Fursaxa originated in 1996 while Tara was playing farfisa organ in the band UN. In 1997, Un broke up and Tara devoted all her musical energy to her Fursaxa project. In 2000, the Japanese label Acid Mothers' Temple released Fursaxa's cd Mandrake, and in March of 2002 Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth released a Fursaxa LP on his Ecstatic Peace label. Tara is currently preparing to release an LP on Nemo Bidstrup's Time-Lag records, as well as starting a Fursaxa website.
- 2:00-5:00 PM in Room 202: English 145.302: Advanced Non-Fiction Writing (Robert Strauss)
- 2:00-5:00 PM in Room 209: English 270.301: Problems in the Interpretation of African American Poetry (Herman Beavers)
- 6:30-9:10 PM in Room 209: (Mytili Jagannathan: mytilij@yahoo.com)
- 5:15 to 7:00 PM in Room 202: The monthly meeting of the Penn & Pencil Club, the writing group for employees of the University and Health System. For more information contact: john.shea@uphs.upenn.edu
- 7-8 PM in Room 202: The Fish Writing Group (Nancy Hoffmann: nhoffmann@earthlink.net)
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Tuesday, 12/3
- 6:30 PM: A reading and program with poet and scholar Rachel Blau DuPlessis.
Rachel Blau DuPlessis received her B.A. from Barnard College and her Ph.D. from Columbia University, both in New York. Among her books are Drafts 1-38, Toll (Wesleyan, 2001), part of her long poem project, and Genders, Races, and Religious Cultures in Modern American Poetry, 1908-1934 (Cambridge, 2001). She is also the author of Writing Beyond the Ending: Narrative Strategies of Twentieth-Century Women Writers (1985), H.D.: The Career of that Struggle (1986), both from Indiana University Press, and The Pink Guitar: Writing as Feminist Practice (Routledge, 1990), a book of experimental essays. She is the editor of The Selected Letters of George Oppen (Duke University Press, 1990), and the co-editor of three anthologies: The Objectivist Nexus: Essays in Cultural Poetics (Alabama, 1999), The Feminist Memoir Project: Voices from Women's Liberation (Three Rivers/Crown, 1998) and Signets: Reading H.D. (Wisconsin, 1990). Prior to the 2001 collection, her poetry appeared in seven books from small presses in the United States and France. Her work is anthologized in Moving Borders: Three Decades of Innovative Writing by Women (Talisman House, 1998). In 1990, DuPlessis held a Pennsylvania Council on the Arts grant for poetry; in 1993, she received an award from the Fund for Poetry. She recently received Temple University's Creative Achievement award (1999) and the Roy Harvey Pearce / Archive for New Poetry Prize (2002). In 2002 she was awarded a Pew Fellowship for Artists. DuPlessis is a professor in the English Department at Temple University, and was introduced by Writers House Director, Kerry Sherin.
Ron Silliman's "review" of this reading appeared on his blog on December 8, 2002.
- 10:30-12:00 PM in Room 202: English 103.001: Poetry (Susan Stewart) (Contact Loretta Williams: loretta@dept.english.upenn.edu)
- 1:30-4:30 PM in Room 202: English 112.301: Creative Writing (Max Apple)
- 1:30-4:30 PM in Room 209: English 145.301: Advanced Non-fiction Writing (Paul Hendrickson: phendric@english.upenn.edu)
- 6:00-8:00 PM in room 209: Suppose an Eye, a poetry writing group (Pat Green patgreen@vet.upenn.edu)
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Wednesday, 12/4
- 1:00 PM: Lunch with author Michael Ondaatje sponsored by Women's Studies, and co-sponsored with the Kelly
Writers House. RSVP to wh@writing.upenn.edu.
A native of Sri-Lanka, Michael Ondaatje emigrated to Canada, by way of England, in 1962. Said to be a fusion of jazz rhythms, film montage technique,
and profoundly beautiful language, Ondaatje's
writing encompasses novels, memoir, poetry, and film. In his
landmark novel, The English Patient -- later made into the Academy
Award-winning film -- he explores the history of people that
history overlooks, intersecting four diverse lives at the end of
World War II.
Other works include the memoir of his childhood,
Running in the Family, his Governor-General's award-winning book of
poetry, There's a Trick With a Knife I'm Learning To Do, and his
most recent novel, Anil's Ghost. In 1992 Ondaatje won the Booker
Prize, the British Commonwealth's highest literary honor. He taught
for many years at York University in Toronto, Canada and is the
author of ten collections of poetry including Handwriting (1999)
and four books of fiction: The English Patient, In the Skin of the
Lion, Coming Through Slaughter and Anil's Ghost. He and his wife,
Linda Spalding, live in Toronto and edit the literary journal,
Brick.
- 4:30 PM: The Judith Roth Berkowitz Endowed Lectureship in Women’s Studies presents:
"A Conversation with Michael Ondaatje"
Co-sponsored by Kelly Writers House and the Annenberg School for Communication.
Free and Open to the Public.
Reception to Follow. - 7:00-8:30 PM in the Arts Cafe: A reading by the students of Mytili Jagannathan's English 10 class.
- Listen to a recording of this event.
- 9 AM-12 PM in Room 202: Graduate Course (Rita Bernard)
- 9 AM-12 PM in the Arts Cafe: English 589: Modern & Contemporary American Poetry (Al Filreis)
- 2:00-5:00 PM in Room 209: English 270.301: Problems in the Interpretation of African American Poetry (Herman Beavers)
- 2-5 PM in Room 202: English 155.301: Writing in the Documentary Tradition (Paul Hendrickson)
- 7-8 PM in Room 202: The Penn Review Literary Magazine. The Penn Review Literary Magazine exists to provide the opportunity for publication to all University of Pennsylvania affiliated writers. We invite any interested writers to submit their work, as well as attend our meetings, which cultivate a forum for University of Pennsylvania students to discuss literature and to participate in the creation of a literary magazine. If interested, please contact Stephanie Langin-Hooper, smlangin@sas.upen.edu.
- 8 PM in Room 209: Manuck!Manuck!, a group that meets every other Wednesday throughout the semester to share and discuss fiction written by its members (Fred Ollinger: follinge@sas.upenn.edu)
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Thursday, 12/5
- 10:00 to 11:00 AM in the Arts Cafe: Harriet Levin's Creative Writing Class (English 010) will present
their collaborative posters on forms in poetry. Open to the public. Refreshments will be served.
- 12:30 PM:
The Penn Humanities Forum presents author Andre Schiffrin, who will discuss the business of getting published as part of "The Year of the Book," in collaboration with The Kelly Writers House. A light lunch will be served. RSVP's are required for this program, please write to wh@writing.upenn.edu.
Andre Schiffrin is Director and Founder of The New Press, a new not-for-profit public interest publication house
founded seven years ago. Before that he was the Director of Pantheon Books, an independent division of Random House,
for 28 years.
Schiffrin was for many years a member of the board of the New York Civil Liberties Union, the Freedom to Publish Committee of the American Association of Publishers, and its anti-censorship committee, the Freedom to Read Committee. He served on the Council of the Smithsonian Institution for twelve years and for six years on the New York Council for the Humanities. He is currently an advisor to the American Center in Paris and a member of the visiting committee to the Graduate Faculty at the New School for Social Research.
Schiffrin recently wrote The Corporatization of Publishing for The Nation, and has also written articles for the New Republic, the New York Times Book Review and European magazines. He has done interviews on C-SPAN, NPR, CNBC, French television and radio, and others.
- 10:30-12:00 PM in Room 202: English 103.001: Poetry (Susan Stewart) (Contact Loretta Williams: loretta@dept.english.upenn.edu)
- 1:30-4:30 in Room 202: English 117: Writing About the Arts (Anthony DeCurtis)
- 8:00 PM in Room 202: Philosophy Circle, an informal discussion group that meets once a week, where members present on issues of interest in philosophy, literature, art and science (Paul Flynn: pflynn@sas.upenn.edu).
- 4:30-6:30 in 202: Mods: Penn Modernism and Twentieth Century Studies Group (Matt Hart: matthart@english.upenn.edu). Jena Osman, "Paronomastic Migrations in the work of Ronald Johnson."
- 5:15 in Room 209: The Eighteenth Century Reading Group. For more information or to join, contact Brett Wilson: bdwilson@english.upenn.edu.
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Friday, 12/6
- 3:30-5:30 PM: Write On! Seventh graders from Lea School in West Philadelphia visit the Kelly Writers House year-long writing workshop series. Students read, write and revise in small writing groups comprised of three Lea students and two Penn student coaches. Write On! is supported by Gear Up and the Writers House Esther T. Saxon Term Fund. (Sara Coelho: scoelho@sas.upenn.edu)
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Saturday, 12/7
- 2:00-5:00 PM: Write-On Holiday Party
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Sunday, 12/8
- 11:00 PM: Live at the Writers House, hosts "Civic Culture - Art Culture - Philadelphia Culture Makers" a show
featruing Lise Funderburg, Greg Giovanni, Michael Barsanti, Bennett
Simpson, Beandrea Davis and musical guest Tara Burke. The one-hour word and music radio show airs on
88.5-FM WXPN.
Bennett Simpson is associate curator at the Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania. Recent curatorial projects include: “Shoot the Singer: Music on Video” at ICA (2002); “Elysian Fields,” at the Centre Pompidou, Paris (2000); “The Production of Production,” co-curated with Tim Griffin at Apex Art, New York (1999). Simpson’s writing on art, music, and media has appeared in Artforum, Artext, Frieze, Texte zur Kunst, and Purple, where he is associate editor. In 2001-2002, Simpson held the Whitney-Lauder Curatorial Fellowship at ICA, Philadelphia, and is a graduate of the Whitney Museum’s Independent Study Program and the University of Virginia.
Beandrea Davis is a senior at the University of Pennsylvania double-majoring in Africana Studies and French. She is the student coordinator of Undergraduate Writing Advising at Penn and has been an advisor for the past 3 years. In the Spring of 2002 she studied in Paris and did an independent study on french hip-hop culture and youth of color in France. She enjoys doing youth organizing work, particularly with young women of color, which she has done in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. during the past four years. She was recently featured in the November issue of Essence Magazine as one of the winners of their Ten Incredible College Women contest. In the fall of 2003 she plans to start her first booklength project about the lives of young women in Bamako, Mali (West Africa). She is considering getting an MFA in creative writing with a concentration in creative non-fiction prose and plans to work as a writer and community organizer. She enjoys morning bike rides, kripalu yoga, and cooking. She is from Middletown, CT.
Lise Funderburg is an essayist, feature writer, and book critic based in Philadelphia. She graduated from Reed College and earned her masters at The Columbia University School of Journalism. Her first book is a collection of oral histories called "Black, White, Other: Biracial Americans Talk About Race and Identity," and she has contributed to numerous anthologies. She has written for The Nation, The New York Times Magazine, the Oprah Magazine, LIFE, TIME, and countless tiny literary journals.
Greg Giovanni has been presented at most of the major venues, galleries, nightclubs and warehouses in Philadelphia over the last dozen years. Most recently, he wrote and directed Naked Cocktail for Brat Productions in the 2001 Philadelphia Fringe Festival. While as Artistic Director and resident playwright of the old Big Mess Theatre. His plays include Napoleon Pullapart (Parts One though Five and a half), Lucy (an operetta), and The Bacchæ after Euripides. and The Ixiondae, a masque. He has also writes a one-person shows including Winners-hailed as "the most significant show in the (Philadelphia Fringe) Festival's three-year history" by the Philadelphia Weekly and Bloom's Fork Caberet for the Rosenbach museum and library. Working in other media, Giovanni produced a dance extravaganza; The Taking Tiger Mountain Lip Sync Show and a notorious spotlight for WHYY; "Medea of Springfield."
Michael Barsanti is the Associate Curator at the Rosenbach Museum & Library, where he works primarily with literary things. He has curated exhibitions and taught classes there on a wide variety of subjects, including portrait photography, wartime poetry, James Joyce manuscripts, and Shakespeare forgeries. He has recently completed his Ph.D. in English Literature at Penn, where he also occasionally teaches classes on modernism and writing.
Fursaxa is the musical project of Tara Burke. She usually plays solo, but has been accompanied live by other musicians, who play mostly guitar and percussion. Fursaxa originated in 1996 while Tara was playing farfisa organ in the band UN. In 1997, Un broke up and Tara devoted all her musical energy to her Fursaxa project. In 2000, the Japanese label Acid Mothers' Temple released Fursaxa's cd Mandrake, and in March of 2002 Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth released a Fursaxa LP on his Ecstatic Peace label. Tara is currently preparing to release an LP on Nemo Bidstrup's Time-Lag records, as well as starting a Fursaxa website.
- 6:30-8:00 PM in the Arts Café: A READ OFF by the students of Paul Hendrickson's Advanced Non-Fiction and Documentary Writing workshops. Descriptions for these courses may be found here: English 145; Engish 155.
- 6-7 PM in Room 209: The Undergraduate Writing Advising Program (contact R.J. Lehman at rlehman@seas.upenn.edu)
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Monday, 12/9
- Fall Term Classes End
- 2:00-5:00 PM in Room 202: English 145.302: Advanced Non-Fiction Writing (Robert Strauss)
- 2:00-5:00 PM in Room 209: English 270.301: Problems in the Interpretation of African American Poetry (Herman Beavers)
- 6:30-9:10 PM in Room 209: (Mytili Jagannathan: mytilij@yahoo.com)
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Tuesday, 12/10
- 6:00 PM in the Arts Cafe: A reading by students from Greg Djanikian's Poetry Workshop, English 113.
Listen to an audio recording of this program.
-
- Reading Days for Final Exams through December 12
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Wednesday, 12/11
- 8:00 PM: Speakeasy: Poetry, Prose, and Anything
Goes, an open mic
performance night. All are welcome!
- 6:00-9:00 PM in Room 202: Deborah Burnham's English 435, Creative Non-Fiction class, final reading & gathering.
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Thursday, 12/12
- noon-1:30, Arts Cafe: meeting (with lunch) of the WXPN Policy
Board
- 5:00 PM: Planning Committee meeting and gathering. (For more information about the "hub," write to wh@writing.upenn.edu)
The annual HUB Holiday Party celebrates the Writers House with readings and musical performances from members of the community.
Listen to a recording of this event.
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Friday, 12/13
- Final Examination Period Begins
- 1:00 to 3:00 PM in the Arts Cafe and Dining Room: A lunchtime review session for Al Filreis's graduate poetry class.
- 3:30 PM in 209: Writers House Talk Poets (Bob Perelman perelman@english.upenn.edu)
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Saturday, 12/14
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Sunday, 12/15
- 6-7 PM in Room 209: The Undergraduate Writing Advising Program (contact R.J. Lehman at rlehman@seas.upenn.edu)
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Monday, 12/16
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Tuesday, 12/17
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Wednesday, 12/18
- 8 PM in Room 209: Manuck!Manuck!, a group that meets every other Wednesday throughout the semester to share and discuss fiction written by its members (Fred Ollinger: follinge@sas.upenn.edu)
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Thursday, 12/19
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Friday, 12/20
- Fall Semester Ends
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Saturday, 12/21
- Winter Break - Kelly Writers House closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Sunday, 12/22
- Winter Break - Kelly Writers House closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Monday, 12/23
- Winter Break - Kelly Writers House closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Tuesday, 12/24
- Winter Break - Kelly Writers House closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Wednesday, 12/25
- Winter Break - Kelly Writers House closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Thursday, 12/26
- Winter Break - Kelly Writers House closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Friday, 12/27
- Winter Break - Kelly Writers House closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Saturday, 12/28
- Winter Break - Kelly Writers House closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Sunday, 12/29
- Winter Break - Kelly Writers House closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Monday, 12/30
- Winter Break - Kelly Writers House closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.
Tuesday, 12/31
- Winter Break - Kelly Writers House closed
Please note that some of the discussions and classes listed below are open to the public and some require advance registration or enrollment. Call 215-746-POEM or e-mail wh@writing.upenn.edu for more info.