Poetry Foundation Announces Fall Events Season
Performances, exhibitions, readings, lectures and musical happenings
CHICAGO – The Poetry Foundation’s fall event season embraces poetry in an array of offerings that range from an experimental oratorio to an audio installation of a Parisian soundscape to a special evening with superstar soprano Renée Fleming and Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Mark Strand. This season is variously local, with the Open Door Readings, focused on Chicagoland writing programs, and a collaboration with the Guild Literary Complex, featuring Ana Castillo; national, with a celebration of Graywolf Press’s 40th anniversary; and international, with tributes to Brecht and Leopardi. You can also hear a lecture by Timothy Donnelly, new poems by A.E. Stallings, Eileen Myles, Carolyn Forché, and Jamaal May, and so much more. The season begins on Thursday, September 4 with the launch of Nepantla: A Journal Dedicated to Queer Poets of Color.
“‘A book must be the axe for the frozen sea inside us,’ Franz Kafka once proposed,” says Robert Polito, president of the Poetry Foundation. “Those are wise and stirring words, particularly as we head towards another fall and winter. Break up the frozen sea inside and out by visiting the Poetry Foundation for a reading or performance this fall season.”
The following events are free admission and open to the public on a first come, first served basis. These fall events take place at the Poetry Foundation, 61 West Superior Street, Chicago, unless otherwise specified. More information about our events is available at poetryfoundation.org/programs/events. Images are available upon request.
Poetry Foundation Fall 2014 Events
Poetry off the Shelf
Launch of Nepantla: A Journal Dedicated to Queer Poets of Color
Thursday, September 4, 7 pm
Duriel E. Harris, Ching-In Chen, Ruben Quesada, and Francisco Aragón help celebrate volume 1, number 1 of a new literary magazine whose mission is to nurture, celebrate, and preserve diversity within the queer poetry community.
Co-sponsored with the Lambda Literary Foundation
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Poetry & Music
Collaborative Arts Institute of Chicago Salon Concert: Robert & Clara Schumann, Friedrich Rückert & Heinrich Heine
Thursday, September 11, 7 pm
Collaborative Arts Institute of Chicago kicks off its Collaborative Works Festival with a salon concert exploring Robert and Clara Schumann’s tumultuous path leading to their marriage in 1840, and the musical outpouring of song that resulted from their union. Featuring Susanna Phillips, soprano; Kelley O’Connor, mezzo-soprano; Nicholas Phan, tenor; Joshua Hopkins, baritone; Myra Huang, piano.
Co-sponsored with the Collaborative Arts Institute of Chicago
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The Open Door Readings
DePaul University's Chris Green & Clare Stuber
Loyola University's Aaron Baker & Lucy Schoyer
Tuesday, September 16, 7 pm
The Open Door series presents work from Chicago’s new and emerging poets and highlights the area’s outstanding writing programs. Each hour-long event features readings by two Chicagoland college and graduate writing program instructors and two of their current or recent students.
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Poetry off the Shelf
Ana Castillo, Cristina Correa & Paul Martínez Pompa
Wednesday, September 17, 7 pm
Award-winning poet, novelist, playwright, and translator Ana Castillo returns to Chicago this year as the Lund-Gill Professor at Dominican University. Author Cristina Correa is a VONA/Voices writer and a Midwestern Voices and Visions awardee. Poet Paul Martínez Pompa, who teaches composition and poetry at Triton College, is a recent recipient of an Illinois Arts Council Literary Award.
Co-sponsored with the Guild Literary Complex
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Poetry off the Shelf
Graywolf Press 40th Anniversary with Katie Ford, Matthea Harvey, & Claudia Rankine
Thursday, September 18, 7 pm
Graywolf Press and the Poetry Foundation welcome you to join a celebration of Graywolf’s 40th anniversary with an evening of poetry featuring readings from Graywolf poets Katie Ford (Blood Lyrics), Matthea Harvey (If the Tabloids Are True What Are You?), and Claudia Rankine (Citizen). A reception and book signing follow. A reception follows the reading.
Co-sponsored with Graywolf Press
Poetry & Music
Freedom of Shadow: A Tribute to Terry Adkins
Saturday, September 20, 6 pm
Join the Poetry Foundation for a performance of Freedom of Shadow: A Tribute to Terry Adkins, an oratorio for voice and electronics by poet Douglas Kearney and experimental musician and sound artist Val Jeanty. A reception follows the performance.
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Poetry off the Shelf
Todd Swift & John Wilkinson
Tuesday, September 23, 7 pm
Two notable British poets read from new volumes of their respective selected poems and discuss the state of contemporary poetry in the UK. Todd Swift is a lecturer in creative writing at Kingston University London and poet-in-residence at Oxfam GB. John Wilkinson chairs the Committee on Creative Writing at the University of Chicago and also teaches in the Department of English Language and Literature.
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Poetry off the Shelf
Giacomo Leopardi: Jonathan Galassi, Michael Caesar & Franco D’Intino
Thursday, September 25, 7 pm
Hailed by many as the greatest Italian poet after Dante, Giacomo Leopardi was born in 1798 and wrote prolifically before his death from cholera in 1837. Join the translators of his Canti and the monumental Zibaldone for a reading and discussion of his legacy. A reception follows the reading and discussion.
Co-sponsored with Istituto Italiano di Cultura
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Poetry off the Shelf
Ko Un
Thursday, October 2, 6 pm
Cindy Pritzker Auditorium
Harold Washington Library Center
400 South State Street
Doors open at 5 pm
The Korean poet and activist makes a rare Chicago appearance. A former Buddhist monk and political prisoner, Ko Un has published more than 150 books and his work has been translated into dozens of languages. The recipient of many honors at home and abroad, he has twice won the South Korean Literature Prize and received the Griffin Trust’s Lifetime Recognition Award.
Co-sponsored with the Chicago Public Library, Sejong Cultural Society, and the Literature Translation Institute of Korea
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Words or Music?
Renée Fleming & Mark Strand
Tuesday, October 7, 7 pm
Two of the greatest living practitioners of their respective art forms explore the power of words and music through conversation and readings. Superstar soprano Renée Fleming and Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Mark Strand contemplate the central theme of Strauss’s final opera, Capriccio: which is more expressive, music or poetry? This special event is presented in collaboration with Lyric Unlimited, inspired by Lyric Opera of Chicago’s upcoming production of Capriccio (performances October 6-28).
Seating is first come, first served. The Poetry Foundation will be giving away a limited number of guaranteed seats for this event! Find us on Twitter @PoetryFound for your chance to win beginning September 22. #LyricPoetryTix
Co-sponsored with Lyric Opera of Chicago.
This program made possible by the generous support of Richard and Susan Kiphart.
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Bagley Wright Lecture Series on Poetry
Timothy Donnelly
Wednesday, October 8, 7 pm
Timothy Donnelly speaks as part of the fall Bagley Wright Lecture Series on Poetry. The series seeks to provide leading poets with the opportunity to explore in depth their own thinking on the subject of poetry and poetics. Timothy Donnelly is the author of two books of poetry, Twenty-seven Props for a Production of Eine Lebenszeit and The Cloud Corporation.
Co-sponsored with the Bagley Wright Lecture Series.
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Harriet Reading Series
Lucy Ives
Thursday, October 9, 6:30 pm
Poet and novelist Lucy Ives’s talk centers on the subject of “disingenuity,” or literary falsehood, and the roles of minor exaggeration, preening, bragging, white lies, swagger, and myth in the construction of the figure of the contemporary author.
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Poetry off the Shelf
MAKE Exchange with Mexican Authors and Visual Artists
Wednesday, October 15, 7 pm
As part of its four-day festival in Chicago and Mexico City, MAKE Literary Productions hosts a multimedia evening with poet and translator Daniel Borzutzky, poet and critic Luis Felipe Fabre, and painter and poet Valerie Mejer Caso. The program will be in Spanish and English with some translations moving from one medium to another, as well as from one language to another.
Co-sponsored with MAKE Literary Productions
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Poetry Day
Carolyn Forché & Jamaal May
Thursday, October 16, 6 pm
Cindy Pritzker Auditorium
Harold Washington Library Center
400 South State Street
Doors Open at 5 pm
Join poets from two generations for the 60th annual Poetry Day. Carolyn Forché’s famed international anthology, Against Forgetting, was praised by Nelson Mandela as “itself a blow against tyranny, against prejudice, against injustice.” Jamaal May’s first book, Hum, won the 2013 Beatrice Hawley Award from Alice James Books.
Inaugurated by Robert Frost in 1955, Poetry Day is one of the oldest and most distinguished poetry reading series in the country.
Co-sponsored with the Chicago Public Library
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Open House Chicago
Saturday and Sunday, October 18 – 19, 10 am – 5 pm
Reception: Saturday, October 18, 4pm
The Poetry Foundation celebrates Open House Chicago with an audio installation created by Silvain Gire and Samuel Hirsch from ARTE Radio: “C’est la Ville!: Urban Voices from Paris and Chicago.” The audio exhibit will also be presented at La Maison de la Poésie in Paris.
The Poetry Foundation and the Consulat Général de France will co-host a reception on Saturday, October 18th from 4pm to 6pm, featuring informal remarks by architect John Ronan, along with writer and co-founder of ARTE Radio Silvain Gire.
Co-sponsored with the Chicago Architecture Foundation.
Supported by the Cultural Service at the Consulate General of France in Chicago and ARTE Radio.
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The Open Door Readings
Columbia College’s Tony Trigilio & Natalia Kennedy
School of the Art Institute of Chicago’s Calvin Forbes & Valerie Wallace
Tuesday, October 21, 7 pm
The Open Door series presents work from Chicago’s new and emerging poets and highlights the area’s outstanding writing programs. Each hour-long event features readings by two Chicagoland college and graduate writing program instructors and two of their current or recent students.
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Poetry off the Shelf
A.E. Stallings
Monday, October 27, 7 pm
A.E. Stallings studied classics in Athens, Georgia and has lived in Athens, Greece since 1999. She has published multiple books of poetry and translation and is the recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation.
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Poetry off the Shelf
Eileen Myles
Sunday, November 2, 2 pm
Tickets go on sale to Chicago Humanities Festival members on Tuesday, September 2 and to the general public on Monday, September 8. Call (312) 494-9509 or visit chicagohumanities.org.
Chronicling the life of the writer in a queer, funny, feminist, and ultimately provocative way has made New York poet Eileen Myles’s readings a mix of stand-up, Zen talk, and poetry. Myles discusses Afterglow, her new fantasy and dog memoir about her longtime companion Rosie.
Co-sponsored with the Chicago Humanities Festival
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Harriet Reading Series
Garrett Caples
Thursday, November 6, 6:30 pm
Author Garrett Caples lives in Oakland and is an editor at City Lights Books, where he curates the Spotlight poetry series. In thistalk, Caples discusses surrealism and contemporary poetry.
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Poetry off the Shelf
A Literary Cabaret
Thursday, November 13, 7 pm
An evening of performance featuring readings by poets Robyn Schiff and Philip Jenks, a collaboration between Toronto-based poet Damian Rogers and Chicago-based Drag City artist Azita Youssefi, and interstitial entertainment by Sally Timms of the long-standing punk band the Mekons.
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The Open Door Reading
Lewis University's Simone Muench & C. Russell Price
Northwestern University's Reginald Gibbons & Christine Pacyk
Tuesday, November 18, 7 pm
The Open Door series presents work from Chicago’s new and emerging poets and highlights the area’s outstanding writing programs. Each hourlong event features readings by two Chicagoland college and graduate writing program instructors and two of their current or recent students.
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Poetry & Music
Bertolt Brecht: Love Poems
Tuesday, December 2, 7 pm
Love Poems is the first volume in David Constantine and Tom Kuhn’s monumental project to translate all of Bertolt Brecht’s poetry into English, much of it for the first time. Join some of Chicago’s finest performers in celebrating Brecht’s love poems. Barbara Brecht-Schall will share her perspective on her father’s legacy in poetry.
Co-sponsored with Liveright Publishing
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Poetry off the Shelf
James Lenfestey
Thursday, December 11, 7 pm
After successful careers in advertising, journalism, and academia, poet James Lenfestey made a pilgrimage to find the remote home of the legendary T’ang poet Han-shan, or Cold Mountain. Lenfestey’s book Seeking the Cave is a chronicle of his journey across continents and cultures, through time, language, and poetry.
Co-sponsored with Milkweed Editions
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The Open Door Readings
Columbia College's Matthew Shenoda & Abigail Zimmer
Lake Forest College's Joshua Corey & Kaisa Cummings
Tuesday, December 16, 7 pm
The Open Door series presents work from Chicago’s new and emerging poets and highlights the area’s outstanding writing programs. Each hourlong event features readings by two Chicagoland college and graduate writing program instructors and two of their current or recent students.
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Poetry off the Shelf
Write Club
Thursday, December 18, 7 pm
Write Club is bare-knuckled literature and just the thing to shake up the holidays. Two opposing writers argue two opposing ideas, and each has seven minutes, no more, to throw their best punches. Hosted by Ian Belknap.
Poetry Foundation Fall 2014 Exhibitions
The Secret Birds: New Drawings by Tony Fitzpatrick
July 1 – September 12
Tony Fitzpatrick draws on his talents as an actor, dramatist, poet, and visual artist for an elaborate array of work with Poetry magazine and the Poetry Foundation. The Secret Birds, a clutch of fantastic creatures of the artist’s own invention, is Fitzpatrick’s final show of drawings before leaving Chicago for New Orleans, where he will study ornithology and natural history at the University of New Orleans. The work is interlaced with poetry, ephemera, and his memory of the city itself: “a bird made from bright planets.”
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Drury Brennan: ulteriori ombre
September 18 – October 24
As a companion piece to the September 20 performance of Douglas Kearney and Val Jeanty’s oratorio for voice and electronics, Freedom of Shadow: A Tribute to Terry Adkins, Berlin-based schriftkunstler (writing artist) Drury Brennan takes over the gallery wall to compose ulteriori ombre (further shadows), a massive calligraphic reaction to Kearney’s original text.
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About the Poetry Foundation
The Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine, is an independent literary organization committed to a vigorous presence for poetry in our culture. It exists to discover and celebrate the best poetry and to place it before the largest possible audience. The Poetry Foundation seeks to be a leader in shaping a receptive climate for poetry by developing new audiences, creating new avenues for delivery and encouraging new kinds of poetry through innovative literary prizes and programs. For more information, please visit poetryfoundation.org.
About Poetry Magazine
Founded in Chicago by Harriet Monroe in 1912, Poetry is the oldest monthly devoted to verse in the English-speaking world. Monroe’s “Open Door” policy, set forth in Volume 1 of the magazine, remains the most succinct statement of Poetry’s mission: to print the best poetry written today, in whatever style, genre or approach. The magazine established its reputation early by publishing the first important poems of T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, Marianne Moore, Wallace Stevens, H.D., William Carlos Williams, Carl Sandburg and other now-classic authors. In succeeding decades it has presented—often for the first time—works by virtually every major contemporary poet.
About the Poetry Foundation Library
The Midwest’s only library dedicated exclusively to poetry, the Poetry Foundation Library invites the reading of poetry through its collections and public programs. Browse a collection of more than 30,000 volumes. Experience audio and video recordings in private listening booths. View exhibitions relating to the world of poetry. The library continues to offer its weekly Wednesday Poemtime, a storytime event for children ages two through five that introduces poetry through fun, interactive readings and crafts; and field trips that welcome group visits from students of all ages and lifelong learners. To learn more or to arrange a field trip, contact [email protected].
Follow the Poetry Foundation and Poetry on Facebook at facebook.com/poetryfoundation or on Twitter @PoetryFound.
POETRY FOUNDATION | 61 West Superior Street | Chicago, IL 60654 | 312.787.7070
Media contact:
Polly Faust, [email protected], 312.799.8065
Elizabeth Burke-Dain, [email protected], 312.799.8016