Blog on Hiatus

Friends, this blog will be on winter break from now (12/17/09) until mid January (sometime around 1/15/09). Thanks for reading, and in the meantime, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanza -- or, well, whatever you celebrate -- and please have a very Happy New Year!

John

Copper Nickel

Among recently established magazines - "recently" referring to the past five years or so - Copper Nickel, of the University of Colorado, Denver, is certainly among the most notable.  The magazine is run almost entirely by students, and led by editor Jake Adam York, who for the last few years has pushed the magazine forward, and even revived it when necessary (As of October 2008, the magazine had exactly 0 subscriptions!).  In the past, the magazine has featured plenty of big names, such as Bob Hicock and George Kalamaras to name a few, as well as many up and coming (soon-to-be big name) writers, such as Jericho Brown in the most recent issue.  They have also given break-through exposure to many new talents (including myself), many of whom have yet to publish elsewhere on the national market.  Furthermore, the magazine has been receiving recognition from, well, the powers that be: recent contributor's work has appeared on such sites as Verse Daily and Poetry Daily four times in the last month.  Plus, let's face it, the design for issue 13 is bangin'.  

So, to get a little political here, if you are thinking of investing in a literary magazine, don't waste your money on Poetry or The New Yorker, both of which you can read online anyways.  Instead, invest in a young journal, brimming with new talent, where the work is fresh, and the journal could really, really benefit from your support - plus, right now the magazine is holding it's Year-End sale, and subscriptions are going for less than nothing!  Look into Copper Nickel, and look into it now.

Copper Nickel

Mark Bibbins & Mary Jo Bang @ KGB Bar 12.14.09

KGB Poetry: Mark Bibbins & Mary Jo Bang

December 14, 2009

7:00 pm - 9:00 pm

KGB Bar

85 E. 4th St.

New York, NY 10003

Mary Jo Bang is the author of five previous collections of poetry, including Elegy, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award.  She lives in St. Louis, Missouri, where she teaches in the writing program at Washington University.

Mark Bibbins is the author of The Dance of No Hard Feelings (Copper Canyon Press).  His poems have appeared in the Paris Review, Poetry and the Yale Review.  He teaches at Columbia University and The New School.

KGB Bar

Columbia Journal Panel Discussion Tomorrow

Hang Together or Hang Apart?

Interdisciplinary Collaboration in the Arts in the Era of Mixed-Media

(A Panel Discussion)

Thursday Dec. 10, 7 p.m., Bluestockings Bookstore, 172 Allen St. at Stanton

In today's mixed-media ferment, how can artists and writers

collaborate across genres to create innovative forms of art? Can

the arts excite a “post-literate” generation? Panelists

are novelist Siri Hustvedt, artist Jon Kessler, poet/painter Marjorie

Welish, filmmaker Michael Almereyda, novelist/poet Terese Svoboda,

and writer Alix Ohlin. Moderated by Gideon Lester. Hosted by

Columbia: A Journal of Literature and Art.

A critically acclaimed novelist, poet, and essayist, Siri Hustvedt has published three volumes of essays, one of poetry, and four novels, including the international bestsellers What I Loved and her recent The Sorrows of an American. Among many other themes, her work explores art, perception, and the permeable boundaries between genres and media.

Sculptor, photographer, and mixed-media artist Jon Kessler combines centuries-old craft with digital and video technology to create “kinetic sculptures” that explore consumerist, fearful, post-utopian society. With sprawling pieces such as The Palace at 4 A.M. he has won acclaim over three decades and been featured at the Whitney Biennial, Carnegie Institute, Deitch Projects, P.S.1, and MOMA.

A renowned poet, painter, and art critic, Marjorie Welish has published eight volumes of poetry, exhibits her paintings at the Baumgartner Gallery and Bjorn Ressle Fine Art, and has received numerous awards in both fields, including fellowships from the Gottlieb and Djerassi Foundations. Her poems have appeared in Best American Poetry series and in many anthologies, and her work was the subject of a comprehensive retrospective at the University of Pennsylvania.

A wildly diverse filmmaker and writer, Michael Almereyda directed the film Hamletstarring Ethan Hawke, wrote and directed documentaries on photographer William Eggleston and playwright Sam Shepard, and has published many essays and criticism on film. One of his most recent films is the post-Katrina love story, New Orleans, Mon Amour. Among other awards, he has been decorated for “expanding the possibilities of experimental film.”

A prolific novelist, poet, translator, and documentary filmmaker, Terese Svoboda has published a dozen books, exhibited her films on PBS and at  MOMA, and debuted her opera WET at the Disney Theater in Los Angeles. She has won numerous awards, including an O. Henry, a Pushcart, a Jerome Foundation Grant in video, a John Golden Award in playwriting, and the Iowa Prize in poetry.

An exhilarating young voice, Alix Ohlin has received acclaim for her debut novel The Missing Person and debut collection Babylon and Other Stories. She has often commented on the relationship between music and fiction, and her work has appeared in the Best New American Voices and Best American Short Stories series.

A dramaturg, artistic director, and writer, Gideon Lester was until recently Acting Artistic Director of the American Repertory Theatre. His translations include plays by Brecht, Buchner, and Marivaux, and his stage adaptations include Kafka's Amerika and Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire. He teaches courses on theater, adaptation, and interdisciplinary collaboration in the School of the Arts at Columbia University.

Metro Rhythm Facebook Fan Page

Please join us now on facebook, where we've recently created a Metro Rhythm fan page!  This way it will be twice as easy to keep up with events, announcements, or contact us.

A Public Space Issue Release Party 12.10.09

December 10: Issue 9 Launch Party!

We hope you can join us at BookCourt to celebrate the launch of Issue 9. Drinks, merriment, and readings by contributors Brian T. Edwards and Idra Novey. There will be issues and totes for sale, plus subscription discounts!

Bookcourt

163 Court Street

Brooklyn, NY

7:00 PM

If you don't know about A Public Space, it's a really great magazine based in Brooklyn. Check out their website here:

A Public Space

Mark Bibbins & Keegan Lester @ Earshot this Friday! 12.04.09

December 4 // 7:30 PM
Mark Bibbins, Christopher Martin
Keegan Lester, David King, Taryn Andrews

Earshot is located at Rose Live Music in Williamsburg, Brooklyn

Rose Live Music
345 Grand Street (b/w Havemeyer & Marcy)
Brooklyn, NY 11211
(718) 599-0069

The cover for this event is $5, but that includes a free drink, which costs $5 anyways!

Earshot NYC

Rose Live Music

John Ashbery at NYU 12.03.09

So!  In my personal opinion, John Ashbery's work more recently hasn't been his greatest - BUT! - here is your (and my) chance to see a giant of American Poetry as he reads from his new book Planisphere.  The event will be held at Vanderbilt Hall, Tishman Auditorium, in Washington Square.

December 3rd @ 7:00 pm 

(But with this one, it's probably best to be early!)

Vanderbilt Hall

Tishman Auditorium

40 Washington Square

New York, NY 10012

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NYU Creative Writing

Cornelia Street Graduate Poetry Series 11/24/09

November 24, 2009

6:00 p.m.

Cornelia Street Cafe

29 Cornelia St.

New York, NY

Come listen to four amazing emerging poets in MFA programs in NYC.

Ben Pease is an MFA candidate in poetry at Columbia University where he once leapt with joy upon finding a library book he thought he had lost and and would have had to pay a $100 late fee on top of the cost of the book. A couple weeks ago, in the midst of being lost on his bike en route to a reading, Pease was flagged down by an old Hasdic man who begged him to enter his house and turn on his air conditioner. Pease complied. He has most recently been commissioned by a team of sage editors (who wish to remain anonymous) to pen a living mythology of the Wichman, an ordinary man with a big heart who wished his name in the record books with an asterisk beside it.

In December, Janlori Goldman will receive an MFA in poetry from Sarah Lawrence College. For a zillion years, she's worked as a civil rights and privacy advocate in Washington D.C. and New York, and has a lucky job teaching at Columbia University. She lives in New York City with her teenage daughter, and is laboring with joy on her first book of poems.

Elsbeth Pancrazi lives north of here, in Inwood, NY; works in a bakery slightly to the west and across one river, in Englewood, NJ; and is an MFA candidate at NYU. In other words, the shape of her life is a large triangle.

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Metro Rhythm Reading a Success!

Hey guys,

I just wanted to write to thank everyone who came out last night.  We had a blast and the reading was really, really successful.  I don't think it could have been better.  We recorded the reading and a friend of ours took photos, so we should be posting that stuff soon.

In other news, the venue did quite well, we were pleasant enough, and we have indeed been invited back.  We are looking to hold another reading on December 11th.  As always, anyone interested in reading then, or sometime next calendar year, please contact Keegan and I at metrorhythmreadingseries@gmail.com.  

Adios,

John

Robert Hass@ Columbia

Thats Right, Robert Hass Will be at Columbia...John is skipping his class for it and so should you

Date: November 16, 2009 from 6:15 pm to 8:15 pm EST Location: Columbia University Morningside Campus Heyman Center for the Humanities, Common Room, 2nd Fl. Contact: For further information regarding this event, please contact Jonah Cardillo by sending email to jgc92@columbia.edu . Info: Click Here to Visit Website.

Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Robert Hass served as Poet Laureate of the United States from 1995 to 1997. He will read a selection of poems, to be followed by an interview with Saskia Hamilton of the Barnard College English Department. Click here for more information on Robert Hass. This event is free and open to the public. No Tickets, no reservations required. Seating is on a first come, first served basis. Skip your classes and come hang out with John and I, and listen to our hero!

Metro Rhythm Reading THIS FRIDAY!!!

Metro Rhythm Reading Series

Friday, November 13th, 8:30pm

at Blue Angel Wines in Williamsburg, Brooklyn

638 Grand St
(between Leonard St & Manhattan Ave) 
Brooklyn, NY 11211

It is just a couple blocks from both the Graham and the Lorimer stop off the L.

Readers will include:

Timothy Donnelly
Alina Gregorian
Kirkwood Adams
Julie Kantor
Amanda Lorencz

hosted by John James and Keegan Lester 

Anyone interested in reading in the future, please send 3-5 poems 

or up to 10 double-spaced pages of prose with a brief bio to metrorhythmreadingseries@gmail.com

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C. D. Wright @ Columbia 11.12.09

The Creative Writing Lecture Series at the School of the Arts presents...

CD Wright: Concerning Why Poetry Offers A Better Deal Than The World's Biggest Retailer

Thursday, November 12, 2009, 7 p.m.

Dodge Hall, Room 413

She has published a dozen collections, most recently, Rising, Falling, Hovering (2008). In 2007 Like Something Flying Backwards, New and Selected Poems was published in England. Her collaboration with photographer Deborah Luster, One Big Self: Prisoners of Louisiana was awarded the Dorothea Lange-Paul Taylor Prize; and a text edition was also released in 2007. Steal Away was on the international shortlist of the Griffin Trust Award. String Light won the 1992 Poetry Center book Award.

Wright is a recipient of a Macarthur Fellowship, a Lannan Literary Award, the Robert Creeley Award, and is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She is the Israel J. Kapstein Professor at Brown University and lives outside of Providence with her husband, poet Forrest Gander.

Orhan Pamuk at the 92nd St. Y, 11.09.09

In his first appearance at the Poetry Center, Orhan Pamuk reads from The Museum of Innocence, his first novel since winning the Nobel Prize in 2006. "Pamuk gives us what all novelists give us at their best: the truth," wrote Margaret Atwood. "Not the truth of statistics, but the truth of human experience at a particular place, in a particular time. And as with all great literature, you feel at moments not that you are examining him, but that he is examining you."

To order tickets to this soon-to-be sold out event, please call our box office at 212-415-550, or click on the website.

Remember, tickets are $19, $10 for those 35 and under!

Columbia Gallery Reading 11.05.09

Remember, remember the Fifth of November,

The Gunpowder Treason and Plot,

I know of no reason

Why the Gunpowder Treason

Should ever be forgot.

Please join us for the Columbia Gallery Reading Series, Thursday, November 5th at 8:00 pm!

501 Dodge Hall

Columbia University

Broadway & 116th St.

There will be free drinks, snacks, and literature... though we won't be blowing up Parliament, I'm afraid.

Poets will include:

Adam Fitzgerald

Lauren Birden

Both talented writers, and friends of mine.

Also reading:

Diane Cook (Fiction)
Jen Miller (Fiction)

Kyle Valenta (Nonfiction)
Tanya Paperny (Nonfiction)

Hope to see you all there. Happy Guy Fawkes Day!

Cheers!

*DATE CHANGE OFFICIAL*

Friends, 

We have checked with the venue and contacted our readers.  The inaugural night of the Metro Rhythm Reading Series has been changed to Friday, November 13th, still at Blue Angel Wines in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.  

Our readers will include:

Timothy Donnelly

Alina Gregorian

Julie Kantor

Kirkwood Adams

Plus a mystery reader who will be taking the place of Thais Miller!

I hope everyone can still make it.

Best,

John

Possible *DATE CHANGE* for the MR Reading Series

Hey guys,

Because of the C. D. Wright lecture at Columbia that same night, we are considering moving the Metro Rhythm Reading Series from Thursday, November 12th to Friday, November 13th.  We still have to check this date with the venue, but this will allow everyone - especially the Columbia crowd - to attend both events.  I hope this doesn't keep anyone from coming!

John

Columbia Faculty Selects @ KGB Bar 11.5.09

Columbia Faculty Selects

November 05, 2009

7:00 pm - 9:00 pm

KGB Bar

Nominated by Columbia M.F.A. faculty, our readers will charm, engage, and mystify all those in attendance with a sampling their best work. 

The line-up this month: 

Janet Mitchell has won the Hob Broun Prize for her fiction, and her stories have appeared in various literary journals and have been optioned to Hollywood. She is a recipient of the John Huston Award for Directing and a Paramount Pictures Fellowship for screenwriting.  Her work as a writer-director includes the short film “How Does Anyone Get Old?” starring Mark Ruffalo and Mina Badie.  She was born and raised in South Jersey, where her heart still resides. 

Katherine Faw Morris is from North Carolina. Her work has appeared in BlackBook, Nylon, and the New York Observer. She is writing a novel, Rock Candy Mountain, about both candy and mountains. 

Adam Boretz is not known for playing Jesse Katsopolis on “Full House” and he never portrayed Dr. Tony Gates on “ER.” Additionally, he did not play drums on the Beach Boys’ classic hit “Kokomo” and did not appear in the music video. He does live in Brooklyn, however. And his short fiction has appeared in Fawlt Magazine and Encyclopedia. He’s also writing a novel about mental illness and a memoir not about mental illness. 

--

What is Faculty Selects?  The first Thursday of each month the Columbia MFA program hosts a reading series with writers selected by the faculty. These fresh talents have finished their coursework and are finished with or near to finished with their first books, but do not yet have a book contract and/or an agent. In recent years, many of our featured writers have achieved critical and commercial success; this is your chance to glimpse who you’ll be reading in 2011!

Faculty Selects is curated by Bryan VanDyke and Emily Austin.

The Los Angeles Review

As the 'about' page on their website states, "With its multitude of cultures, Los Angeles roils at the center of the cauldron of divergent literature emerging from the West Coast. "  Established in 2003 by the editors at Ren Hen Press, The Los Angeles Review aims to publish literature that is representative both of the west coast and of the nation at large.  The journal publishes work from established and emerging writers alike, some who have published books with Ren Hen (such as Charles Harper Webb in issue 5), some who have not published with Ren Hen, and others who have yet to publish a full-length collection at all (For example, my friend David Harrity published work in the most recent issue).  Aside from a fairly large amount of poetry, they generally publish 4-5 pieces of non-fiction, 5-10 pieces of fiction, and a small number of reviews and translations.  Young amongst our nation's journals, this is definitely one to check out - plus, last time I was at Book Culture (on Broadway and 112th) they had a few copies on the shelf!

Website

Metrorhythm's first reading!!!

Hey everyone,

 Metro Rhythm's first reading will take place on:

November  12th, at 8:30pm

at Blue Angel Wines  in Williamsburg, Brooklyn

638 Grand St
(between Leonard St & Manhattan Ave)
Brooklyn, NY 11211

It is just a couple blocks from both the Graham and the Lorimer stop off the L.



At the event reading will be:


The Super Famous:  Timothy Donnelly

From the new school,The Almost Famous:  Alina Gregorian
From Columbia University, the slightly famous for all the right reasons: Julie Kantor
Also repping Columbia University, the always charming and often pretty:  Kip Adams 
From NYU, our newest facebook friend:  Thais Miller




Please come for the wine, stay for the poetry...and further for the after party, which will take place either above the wine shop, or two doors down from it...


And a special thank you to all who are interested in partaking, whether reading, or drinking, or drinking and reading, or drinking, reading and nodding your head in the back, because at the end of the day our ultimate goal is poetry listening awareness.   If you are interested in reading at future events, please email either john or I at Kml2157@columbia.edu or jpj2113@columbia.edu with some sample stuff, that you think is your groovyest, and would make for promoting some great poetry listening awareness...(we do accept prose, but please send in short stories no longer than 7 pages double spaced, short humiliating non-fiction pieces are encouraged) their is no age requirement or MFA vs Non- MFA preference.  


Hope to see all  of you there.

Best Wishes,

Keegan 

Metro Rhythm Reading Series

Friends,

We are excited to announce that Blue Angel Wines in Williamsburg has agreed to let us host a poetry reading this November. We are hoping this will be the inaugural reading of the Metro Rhythm Reading Series. We are currently in the process of selecting readers for this event. We've just about got this one figured out, but if you'd like to read in the future, please contact myself (John James) at john.james2113@gmail.com and Keegan Lester (kml2157@columbia.edu). Send us 3-5 poems or about 10 double-spaced pages of prose (We generally focus on poetry, but we like to keep our minds open to the entire literary community). There is no particular style or school that we currently subscribe to, we simply look for good - no, no, THE BEST - material out there.

The first reading will be held (*This is still tentative, so don't hold me to it!*) on the second Tuesday in November at Blue Angel Wines, Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

That's all for now. I'll update this old blog as the info comes to me.

John



Blue Angel Wines
638 Grand Street
Brooklyn, NY 11211