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In light of 2012 marking the two hundredth anniversary of the births of Robert Browning, Charles Dickens, and Edward Lear, the Guardian examines the literary afterlife; Studs Terkel would have turned one hundred yesterday, and the city of Chicago is celebrating the occasion; the New Yorker considers Get Your War On author David Rees’s business of artisanal pencil sharpening; and other news.
Famed novelist Carlos Fuentes passed away Tuesday in Mexico City. He was eighty-three; the Guardian looks at the legacy of the great John Updike; a former pharmaceutical executive, Andrew G. Bodnar, convicted of a white-collar crime, was sentenced to write a book; and other news.
If you were unable to attend Barney Rosset's memorial at Cooper Union's Great Hall in New York City last week, Evergreen Review has posted remembrances; the New Yorker has introduced Page-Turner, a new daily books blog; Alice Bolin visits the Montana grave of poet Richard Hugo; and other news.
In Moscow, thousands took to the streets to walk with a group of writers who organized a protest against government efforts to discourage public gatherings; Steve Almond looks at the Washington Post's Mitt Romney bullying story through the eyes of his adolescent self; Lisa Cholodenko is slated to direct adaptations of Tom Perrota's The Abstinence Teacher and Cheryl Strayed's Wild; and other news.
Radio Free Europe explains how an obscure nineteenth-century Kazakh poet, Abai, has become an unlikely symbol of the protests opposing Putin's return to power in Russia; Forbes features Jeff Mayersohn, the person who saved Harvard Bookstore from oblivion; the Guardian reports that the mysterious lover Federico García Lorca directed his sonnets has been revealed; and other news.
Marea Gordett, owner of Big Mind Learning, an educational firm serving students in the Capital region of New York, and author of the poetry book, Freeze Tag, published by Wesleyan University Press, blogs about her P&W–supported writing workshops at the Marillac Family Shelter in Albany.
When I moved from Boston to Albany, New York, in the 1990s, I was bereft at losing the teaching connections I had found in a large metropolitan area. While I knew there were various programs in the area—the New York State Writers’ Institute was one—I didn’t feel a part of the literary community. A friend recommended I apply to the Readings/Workshops program at Poets & Writers for funding, and I’ve been thrilled ever since to find this network again through my work in community centers, libraries, and senior centers throughout Albany County and at the beautiful Arkell Museum and Canajoharie Library in Montgomery County.
In these workshops, I am not only aware of what I receive from and give to writers, but also how the group itself develops its own identity and offers its own gifts. When we create a space that allows us to freely write about joy, pain, and longing and encourages others to listen to these often long-withheld emotions—amazing changes can happen. Regardless of differences in age and experience, we all write from a deep, secret place. And then we share, which helps us feel a growing sense of peace and helps to diminish loneliness.
This was especially evident to me this winter when I conducted a workshop at the Marillac Family Shelter in Albany. Part of St. Catherine’s Center for Children, this emergency housing program for homeless families meets the initial need for shelter and assists families in empowerment and education. I found a warm welcome when I proposed a writing workshop for teens and mothers called “You Are Unlimited.” In this pilot program, held once a week for five weeks, a core of eight people and a constantly-changing extended group gathered in a well-maintained recreation/computer room and wrote, shared, and performed their poems and life stories. As I entered the room every Thursday, mothers with babies and young children would clear the space and shut the door. The dedicated teens, with their mothers usually sitting on couches a few feet away, would be hushed and ready to write, even after a full day of school.
Participants wrote long Delight Chants in response to Nikki Giovanni’s poem, “Ego Tripping,” and celebratory litanies after hearing Nazim Hikmet’s poem, “Things I Didn’t Know I Loved.” After overcoming their initial resistance and with support from staff members, the writers eagerly embraced the free-form poems and wrote lines such as the following:
My real name is J.H.
I want it to mean beautiful. I am a tornado.
I am a spinner. I am a very big swirl.
The enthusiastic staff members wrote with the students and mothers, gently encouraging them. When one of the mothers shared her work, the others followed, and eventually everyone lined up to have his or her work videotaped, accompanied by the applause and shouts of an appreciative audience. When one staff member read her words, everyone nodded in agreement:
I didn’t know I loved the table
until I missed the love that surrounded it.
I didn’t know I loved rice
until we had to do without it.
I didn’t know I loved the tides
until they washed away my impatience.
This spirit of warmth and camaraderie vanquished pessimism and sadness, if only for an afternoon. I’m tremendously grateful to the support of Poets & Writers for letting my teaching come to life again, and helping me bring to various corners of my region workshops that help restore trust. Especially during this time of resignation, Poets & Writers gives solace and hope.
Photo: Workshop participant. Credit: Marea Gordett
Support for Readings/Workshops in NewYork is provided, in part, by public funds from the NewYork State Council on the Arts, with additional support from the Friends of Poets & Writers.
Poet Joshua Clover and eleven students may face jail for taking part in a bank protest at UC Davis; Stephan Lee pitches a writing competition as a new reality show; Open Culture gathered over four hundred free audio books, including works by Conrad, Poe, and Wharton; and other news.
The American Booksellers Association requests ABA members make their thoughts known on the agency model to the Department of Justice; twenty-four people recently undertook a full-scale re-enactment of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales; author Emily St. John Mandel considers genre fiction and the marketing labels placed on books; and other news.
In the ongoing court battle over book scans, Google seeks to dismiss the Authors Guild class-action suit; Time magazine visits author John Irving at his New Hampshire home; the professional life of Jane Austen; and other news.
The Guardian takes a look at the Tehran International Book Fair; a beta version of LitFactor, a website meant to connect writers and agents is launched; and Flavorwire features the ten best memoirs about mothers.
