Poets & Writers Theater

Have you ever been curious about the history of words like “cool” or “on fleek?” In this WIRED magazine video, linguists Nicole Holliday and Ben Zimmer talk about the origins and trends of popular slang words, old and new.

“What does it mean when we say books unite us? It means that books can be the tethers, that books can connect human beings.” In this video, Jason Reynolds, honorary chair of Banned Books Week 2021, talks about the importance of reading a range of narratives and stories that make up this “tapestry of life” and the danger of censoring that knowledge. “To censor a book is to damage the framework in which we live,” says Reynolds.

“These times are really ripe for different opportunities and taking different approaches to things because everyone’s sort of making it up as they go along.” In this BLDRfly video, Wisteria Bristol, Peter Jones, and Sofia Miranda, co-owners of Trident Booksellers & Café in Boulder, Colorado, speak about shifting the store to an employee-owned model during the pandemic and how that has affected their connection to the community. For more, read “From Booksellers to Owners” by Lynn Rosen in the May/June issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

Who doesn’t appreciate a nice notebook to write in? Belgian expat and artist Henry might be taking his love of Moleskine notebooks a step too far in this New Yorker Shorts & Murmurs film written, performed, and directed by Sam Bronowski.

“By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes.” Watch the trailer for The Tragedy of Macbeth, a film based on the play of the same name by William Shakespeare, written and directed by Joel Coen and starring Denzel Washington, Frances McDormand, and Corey Hawkins.

“Human creativity is nature manifest in us.” In this TED Talk video, actor and author Ethan Hawke speaks about the importance of creativity, the necessity of taking leaps to express yourself, and how we turn to poetry for sustenance.

House of Gucci is an upcoming film based on Sara Gay Forden’s 2000 book, The House of Gucci: A Sensational Story of Murder, Madness, Glamour, and Greed. The anticipated film is directed by Ridley Scott and stars Lady Gaga, Adam Driver, Salma Hayek, Jared Leto, and Al Pacino.

“It’s all about providing access, not only to education, not only to learning, but also to a free public space where people can actually come together and engage,” says copresident Andreas Dracopoulos of the newly renovated and transformed Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library, a branch of the New York Public Library in Midtown Manhattan that reopened in June.

“It seemed I had stumbled into a collective desire to connect in one of the only ways that felt safe to people.” In this Pop-Up Magazine video, Rachel Syme speaks about organizing a worldwide pen pal exchange called Penpalooza, which is featured in “Pandemic Pen Pals” in the March/April issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“For people who have so little…it’s so deeply appreciated that it’s almost life-changing.” In this 2010 video, Gary Fine speaks about the Prisoner Express program, which sends packages of books along with a personalized, handwritten note to participants who are incarcerated. For more on the growth of the program, read “Books Offer Lifeline in Incarceration” by Alissa Greenberg in the January/February issue of Poets & Writers Magazine. 

“You knew that she was motivated by the basic concept that we’re here for a short while, and we have to make sure we make it about something larger than just ourselves.” In this video from the 2020 National Book Awards Ceremony, authors and colleagues speak about the influence of Carolyn Reidy, the late president and CEO of Simon & Schuster, who was honored with the National Book Foundation’s 2020 Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community. Reidy died on May 12, 2020 at the age of seventy-one.

In this Literary Hub video, Book Marks editors Dan Sheehan and Katie Yee offer a week in review of book news, including the Center for Fiction’s 2020 First Novel Prize longlist and plans for a new HBO Max series of bedtime stories read by celebrities such as Idris Elba, Lucy Liu, and Keanu Reeves.

“If we only read the same type of authors all our lives it’s like you’re only hearing one thread, one voice.” In this video from the 2019 Louisiana Literature festival, Elif Shafak talks about reading the same books over and over again as a child, and why it’s more inspiring to read “from East and West, fiction and nonfiction.”

In this edition of PEN to Paper, James Hannaham talks about how “word choice creates atmosphere and character all by itself” and leads writers through several language-related exercises, including one that involves taking a New York Times online quiz on dialect.

“I’m also asking you to unleash the cry of the subconscious, and to listen and record that voice from within without fear or judgment. Listening to yourself in that way is actually a radical act of self-love.” Ananda Naima González leads an exercise in asemic writing for PEN to Paper, a video series of original writing exercises from authors participating in PEN America’s 2020 Digital World Voices Festival: These Truths.

“I acquired a copy of my great-great-grandfather’s diaries in 2013,” says Lauren Russell about the inspiration for her new book, Descent (Tarpaulin Sky Press, 2020), at an event with author Megan Milks for Brown University’s Authors in the Archives series in 2019. Descent is featured in Page One in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“The most astonishing thing to happen in the almost 14 billion years since the birth of the cosmos is that ordinary, apparentle inert matter, has—by its self-organizing capacity (or, autopoesis)—become conscious.” Harry Dodge reads from his debut book, My Meteorite: Or, Without the Random There Can Be No New Thing (Penguin Books, 2020), and discusses its themes in a conversation with Maggie Nelson in their Los Angeles home.

As part of a fundraising effort to help Chicago independent bookstore Volumes Bookcafe during the coronavirus pandemic shutdown, Rebecca Makkai enlisted over two dozen writers—including Kristen Arnett, Alexander Chee, Garth Greenwell, Andrew Sean Greer, Lauren Groff, Mira Jacob, Mitchell S. Jackson, R. O. Kwon, Victor LaValle, and Susan Orlean—to participate in a collective performance of the dance scene from John Hughes’s classic 1985 high school film, The Breakfast Club.  

In this PEN to Paper series video, PEN America president Jennifer Egan guides viewers through a short writing exercise involving a “word throw,” designed to help writers to free up their minds to the unconscious imagination. The series is part of PEN America’s 2020 World Voices Festival: These Truths, held digitally this year.

On The Kristen Arnett Show based at the Black Mountain Institute and presented by Literary Hub on Instagram Live, Arnett talks about launching the paperback edition of her first novel, Mostly Dead Things (Tin House Books, 2019), and discusses life during the pandemic with special guest Hanif Abdurraqib.