Poets & Writers Theater

“The orchard was on fire, but that didn’t stop him from slowly / walking / straight into it, shirtless,” reads Carl Phillips from his poem “Dirt Being Dirt” in this video produced by Washington University in St. Louis where he is a professor. Phillips, author of fifteen books of poetry, most recently Pale Colors in a Tall Field (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2020), is the recipient of the 2021 Jackson Poetry Prize.

In this reading presented by the Kenyon Review, Shira Erlichman, Ross Gay, and Saeed Jones read poetry and present interdisciplinary work, as well as discuss their inspirations and writing processes in a discussion with the magazine’s editor Nicole Terez Dutton.

In this CBS Sunday Morning video, Washington Post book critic Ron Charles gives his book report on new recommendations for the summer, including Sanjena Sathian’s debut novel, Gold Diggers (Penguin Press, 2021), Great Circle (Knopf, 2021) by Maggie Shipstead, and The Man Who Lived Underground (Library of America, 2021) by the late Richard Wright, which is featured in Page One in the May/June issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

Nine Perfect Strangers is a television adaptation of Liane Moriarty’s novel of the same name starring Bobby Cannavale, Luke Evans, Regina Hall, Nicole Kidman, Melissa McCarthy, and Michael Shannon. The Hulu miniseries follows nine strangers who attend a wellness retreat at a place called the Tranquillum House run by a mysterious woman.

“It’s in your hands: the weight of the slats. All slightly bent to one side. As someone that bends with their ear towards the other trying to hear more: what?” Silvina López Medin reads her poem “The Sound of Blinds Being Pulled Up Is the First Sound” from her book Poem That Never Ends (Essay Press, 2021) in this video for Poetry Daily.

“I had always been interested in blending reality or elevating the surrealistic elements of real life.” In this episode of the Woolfer Author Series, host Carmen Tanner Slaughter talks with Morgan Jerkins about transitioning between nonfiction and fiction writing, and her debut novel, Caul Baby (Harper, 2021), which is featured in Page One in the May/June issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“I hadn’t really planned this to be narrated by an AI creature,” says Kazuo Ishiguro answering questions from readers about his latest novel, Klara and the Sun (Knopf, 2021), in this video for the Get Lit virtual book club series with host of WNYC’s All Of It Alison Stewart.

“Discipline is a massive component of creating a body of work, and the further I get, the more I see that that really is true,” says Rachel Cusk in this 2019 interview with Tonny Vorm at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Denmark. Cusk’s novel Second Place (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2021) is featured in Page One in the May/June issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

In this virtual reading hosted by Magers & Quinn Booksellers, authors Lilly Dancyger, Gina Frangello, and Jeannine Ouellette read from their memoirs and discuss the similarities between their writing processes. Dancyger’s Negative Space (Santa Fe Writers Project, 2021) and Frangello’s Blow Your House Down: A Story of Family, Feminism, and Treason (Counterpoint Press, 2021) are featured in Page One in the May/June issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“Revelation never comes as a fern uncoiling / a frond in mist; it comes when I trip on a root, / slap a mosquito on my arm,” reads Arthur Sze from his poem "Earthshine" in this 2008 video for the Lunch Poems reading series at the University of California, Berkeley. Sze’s latest collection, The Glass Constellation: New and Collected Poems (Copper Canyon Press, 2021), is featured in Page One in the May/June issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“It was sodden daylight. The rain had stopped, but she could hear water dripping off things.” In this Stony Brook University virtual event, Elizabeth McCracken reads from her new story collection, The Souvenir Museum (Ecco, 2021), which is featured in Page One in the May/June issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“There’s a sister who works so hard she never talks. / A sister who screams when she hears dogs bark.” Monica Sok reads “Sestina” from her debut poetry collection, A Nail the Evening Hangs On (Copper Canyon Press, 2020), for Women Warriors: A Solidarity Reading, presented by the Asian American Writers’ Workshop, which featured over forty Asian American women writers. 

“The storm funneled through town with destructive intent. / Fractured tree limbs, toppled fences, rippled shingles / like tufts of hair.” In this PBS NewsHour video, Fady Joudah reads “House of Mercury” from his poetry collection Tethered to Stars (Milkweed Editions, 2021), which is featured in Page One in the March/April issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“My mother doesn’t write recipes, / she just knows. // Braised pork and eggs, / rice cleaned thoroughly.” Joshua Nguyen, author of the chapbook, American Lục Bát for My Mother (Bull City Press, 2021), reads two poems in this video for the Write About Now Poetry reading series in Houston. 

“We were the unwanted, the unneeded, and the unseen, invisible to all but ourselves,” reads Washington Post’s Robin Givhan from Viet Thanh Nguyen’s latest novel, The Committed (Grove Press, 2021), in this conversation with the Pulitzer Prize–winning author on how history and memory have shaped his life and writing. 

“I became interested in Black poets writing about the animal as the result of my own work,” says Joy Priest at the beginning of her virtual craft talk titled “The Black Poet & the Deer: On the Transpositional Phenomena of the Line” for the Vermont Studio Center. Priest is the author of Horsepower (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020) and was a featured guest writer for Craft Capsules, a series of micro craft essays exploring the finer points of writing.

“Sometimes I feel like I’ve already seen everything that’s gonna happen. And it’s a nightmare.” Watch the trailer for Cherry, a film adaptation of Nico Walker’s 2018 debut novel of the same name, starring Tom Holland as a young man who ends up robbing banks to support his drug addiction.

“The story of this family is a common one. It’s the reality of so many people I know and love, yet it’s one I never saw depicted in any novel,” says Patricia Engel in this video about the inspiration behind her new novel, Infinite Country (Avid Reader Press, 2021), which is featured in Page One in the March/April issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“Remember her name. Isabel Allende.” In this trailer for Isabel: The Intimate Story of Isabel Allende, a three-part biopic miniseries premiering on HBO Max on March 12, the prolific Chilean writer’s life is portrayed from her childhood in Chile to her career as a celebrated and award-winning author.

“Talking about poetry, especially in the U.S. context, you’re treated like you’re the village fool,” says Natalie Scenters-Zapico about identifying as a poet in this episode of Line /Break with host Laura Buccieri. “Usually, if we learn anything the fool is the one that carries most of the wisdom.” Scenters-Zapico is the author of Lima :: Limón (Copper Canyon Press, 2019), which was included on the international shortlist for the 2020 Griffin Poetry Prize.