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L. S. Klatt reads a poem from Cloud of Ink (University of Iowa Press, 2011) in this short film by Tom Jacobsen. Andrew Wyeth, who died in 2009, was a visual artist best known for his painting "Christina's World," an image of which appears in the clip.
Celebrating the kickoff of National Novel Writing Month, the website HubPages, a sort of micro-blogging community, is holding a no-fee writing contest—for poets as well as fiction writers. Prizes of five hundred dollars, one hundred dollars, and fifty dollars will be given to writers in both genres, and one overall winner will be offered publication of a poetry or story collection via self-publishing outfit Smashwords (though editing of the manuscript is not part of the prize).
Writers are invited to create a HubPages login and then publish the works they wish to enter as "hubs," or short posts that are housed on the website under a variety of topic headings: poems and poetry, creative writing, and so on. Every post must be accompanied by a photo (a separate photo competition is also being held in conjunction with the writing contests).
The winners, to be announced on December 2, will be selected by judging panels made up of staff members and HubPages users pulled from the more than two-hundred-thousand registered with the site. Entries may be posted (with the tag "contest") until November 22.
Complete guidelines, including links to the profiles of each panelist, are available on the Hub Patron of the Arts web page.
Today marks the beginning of National Novel Writing Month; New Hampshire's RiverRun Bookstore is in danger of closing; Pauline Kael's rivalry with Joan Didion; and other news.
In Nothing: A Portrait of Insomnia, published last month by Harper Perennial, Blake Butler uses scientific data, historical anecdote, Internet obsession, and figures as diverse as Andy Warhol, John Cage, Jorge Luis Borges, and Stephen King to explore the tension between sleeping and conscious life. This bizarre trailer, directed by Drew Mobley, evokes Butler's own 129-hour bout of insomnia described in the book.
While other social networking sites are useful for playful community-building, LinkedIn provides a place for professional writers to focus on sincerity when creating connections.
While U.S. publishers continue their cautious march into the digitization of American titles, the rest of the world is looking to take advantage of other burgeoning markets in Europe, Japan, and beyond.
Despite the average wired American’s tendency to downsize their character counts, the page counts of newly published books of translated fiction show that the rest of the global literary community may be beefing up.
Longtime P&W-supported sponsor and writer M. L. Liebler, author of fourteen books of poetry including The Moon A Box, which received the 2005 Patterson Poetry Award of Excellence, blogs about curating and hosting Wayne State University's Thursdays in the D in Detroit, Michigan.
On September 22, over one hundred folks packed the Scarab Arts Club in downtown Detroit’s cultural center to hear a wild, fun, and moving reading/performance by a wide variety of literary artists. Thanks to Wayne State University’s Office of Student Affairs and its great staff, I was honored to curate and host Thursdays in the D with Detroit singer/songwriter Audra Kubat, poet Brian Gilmore from D.C., deaf hip-hop star Sean Forbes from Detroit, former slam star Jeffrey McDaniel from New York City, and the insanely talented Jessica Care Moore from Detroit.
I would say 75 percent of the audience had never attended a poetry reading. The audience was made up of urban and suburban students and teachers, senior citizens, blue collar workers, labor activists, college deans, and others, all of whom came together to listen, enjoy, and join in the fun of poetry. It’s a beautiful thing to see the arts thrive in a city that has been hit very, very hard by the recession. Our community is clearly nourished by the arts, and this program was ample proof.
The program began with Detroit’s young singer/songwriter, in the Joni Mitchell tradition, Audra Kubat. Audra’s lyrics are basically poems set to music. Brain Gilmore of the D.C. poetry scene and DC Writer's Corps followed and delivered a great set of poems, with Frank F. Koscielski on piano, as a wonderful homage to Duke Ellington from his book Jungle Nights & Soda Fountain Rags. Next up was Detroit’s Sean Forbes, a deaf young hip-hop artist working with Eminem, who stunned the audience with his cool hip-hop beats and poems as he signed and spoke his work. Jeffrey McDaniel, Pitt Poetry Series author of The Endarkenment, delivered from his old school slam days a fabulous set combining high quality poetry with precision timing and showmanship. To conclude Jessica Care Moore, star of HBO Def Poetry Jam, delivered politically charged poems in the spirit of the late Gil Scott-Heron, Black Star, and Public Enemy’s Chuck D. To put the cherry on the sundae, nationally known Shakespeare impersonator Chuck Wilcox came up to the podium in costume and performed a Shakespeare sonnet!
Folks, I don’t care where you live in this great country (or world, for that matter), it just doesn’t get any better than this. Ah, Thursdays in the D makes me glad to be alive in this wonderful city.
Photo: M. L. Liebler.
Support for Readings/Workshops events in Detroit, is provided by an endowment established with generous contributions from the Poets & Writers Board of Directors and others. Additional support comes from the Friends of Poets & Writers.
