720 East Locust
Milwaukee
Wednesday, November 11, 7pm
NEW PROSE SERIES
Timothy Yu is the author of the chapbook Journey to the West (Barrow Street) and the critical book Race and the Avant-Garde: Experimental and Asian American Poetry since 1965 (Stanford University Press). His poems and prose have appeared in SHAMPOO, Chicago Review, and Another Chicago Magazine. He teaches at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
A groundbreaking study of contemporary American poetry, Race and the Avant-Garde changes the way we think about race and literature. Examining two of the most exciting developments in recent American writing, Timothy Yu juxtaposes the works of experimental language poets and Asian American poets—concerned primarily with issues of social identity centered around discourses of race. Yu delves into the 1960s social upheaval to trace how Language and Asian American writing emerged as parallel poetics of the avant-garde, each with its own distinctive form, style, and political meaning.
From its provocative reevaluation of Allen Ginsberg to fresh readings of Ron Silliman, Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, and John Yau, along with its analysis of a new archive of Asian American writers from the 1970s, this book is indispensable for readers interested in race, Asian American studies, contemporary poetry, and the avant-garde.
Saturday, November 14th, 7pm.
Eileen Myles is a poet (Sorry, Tree, Not Me etc.) who writes fiction (Cool for You, Chelsea Girls) and whose The Importance of Being Iceland/travel essays in art, for which she received a Warhol/Creative Capital grant will be out in July from Semiotext(e)/MIT. She ran St. Mark's Poetry Project in the 80s. She conducted an openly female write-in campaign for President of the US in 1992. She is a Professor Emeritus of Writing at UCSD. She writes for Parkett, The Believer, Vice, The Nation, The Stranger, AnOther Magazine and is blogging all summer on the Harriet site. The Inferno/a poet's novel will probably be out next year. She lives in New York.
Bio-Poetics: Science, Language and Poetry
with Marie Larson
Sunday, November 15, 1-4pm
$30 / $25 members
In this workshop we'll investigate the many ways scientific enquiry serves as raw material for writing poems. Looking towards biology, astronomy, chemistry and quantum physics this workshop will explore how the strange beauty of scientific knowledge, theory and language can feed the content and lyric of our poems. We'll also explore how scientific ideas can lend a language for discussing poetic structure. How is a poem a living organism? How is it a black hole? A membrane? Through writing exercises and looking at work by writers working from science, we'll widen and shift our poetic vocabularies and perception of the phenomena around us.
Marie Larson holds an MFA in poetry from Naropa University's Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics. Her work has appeared in GAM, DIAGRAM, Shampoo, Bombay Gin, and Fact-Simile. She also has work forthcoming in the anthology Chicken Boa: Notes on Skrilla (Mitzvah Chaps). Larson's review of Lila Zemborain's mauve sea-orchids appeared in issue 37 of Jacket Magazine. Her current project, Blight, looks to press against the taxonomical membrane of what it means to be human.
Friday Nov. 20 7pm
Redletter reading with Nick Demske, Michael Bernstein, Jill Wohlgemuth, with open mic.
Sunday, November 22nd 2pm.
John Koethe's 95th Street Book Release Reading
Tonight poet John Koethe reads from his newest poetry collection, Ninety-fifth Street. Koethe received the Kingsley Tufts Award for Falling Water (1997), the Frank O’Hara Award for Domes (1973), and the Bernard F. Connors Award. His poetry has been included in several anthologies, including Best American Poetry. He has been granted fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. He has also received a lifetime achievement award from the Council for Wisconsin Writers.
