Poets & Writers Theater

“Look at the old house in the dawn rain / all the flowers are forms of water…” In this excerpt from the documentary Even Though the Whole World Is Burning, the late W. S. Merwin reads his poem “Rain Light.” Merwin’s final collection, Garden Time (Copper Canyon Press, 2016), was featured in Page One in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

In this New Yorker video, Teju Cole, author of Known and Strange Things (Random House, 2016), reflects on his American citizenship and Nigerian upbringing from his home in Brooklyn. Cole is featured in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

In this TEDx Talk, Sharon Olds speaks about the moments “in between” that have inspired her life and poetry, and reads from her collection Stag's Leap (Knopf, 2012), as well as her poem “Ode to the Hymen.” Olds's latest collection, Odes (Knopf, 2016), is featured in Page One in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

Yona Harvey reads some of her poetry, talks about her artistic process, and discusses health and the body in a short film directed by Julie Sokolow. Read about the Center for African American Poetry and Poetics, which Harvey cofounded with Dawn Lundy Martin and Terrance Hayes, in “A New Center for Black Poetics” in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“What does it say of you if everything is dispensable?” Jonathan Safran Foer speaks about the themes and characters in his new novel, Here I Am (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2016), which is featured in Page One in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“It's a series of pages that have huge holes, or volumes, where words fly off the page into your imagination, into your face. It's kind of a book that has no rules.” Choreographer Wayne McGregor and visual artist Olafur Eliasson speak with Kathleen Flood of the Creators Project about Jonathan Safran Foer’s art book, Tree of Codes (Visual Editions, 2010), which was the inspiration for their 2015 dance performance. Foer’s new novel, Here I Am (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2016), is featured in Page One in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

As part of the Aquinas College Contemporary Writers Series, Peter Ho Davies reads a section from his novel The Fortunes (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016), which at the time was titled Your Name in Chinese. The Fortunes is featured in Page One in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“My aim was to write this integrated history, and at the same time manage to create in the reader these moments of disbelief.” Saul Friedländer, whose new memoir, Where Memory Leads: My Life (Other Press, 2016), is featured in “Nine More New Memoirs” in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine, explains his approach to writing about the history of Nazi Germany and the Holocaust.

Nicholson Baker discusses writing about the details in objects, focusing on the positives of technology, and cross-cultural respect at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. Baker’s new nonfiction book, Substitute: Going to School With a Thousand Kids (Blue Rider Press, 2016), which chronicles his experiences as a public school substitute teacher, is featured in Page One in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

Ann Patchett speaks with her publisher Jonathan Burnham about the use of time as a theme in her new novel, Commonwealth (HarperCollins, 2016), which is featured in Page One in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine. Also in the issue, Patchett speaks about her bookstore Parnassus Books in "Best-Selling Booksellers" by Lynn Rosen.

Leigh Stein reads from her debut novel, The Fallback Plan (Melville House, 2012), and shares poems from her collection, Dispatch From the Future (Melville House, 2012), for an interview at the University of DuPage with Tom Fate. Stein's latest book, Land of Enchantment (Plume, 2016), is featured in “Nine More New Memoirs” in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“I love the physical book. I love the printed page.” Louise Erdrich, author of LaRose (Harper, 2016), talks about her love of books and her bookstore Birchbark Books & Native Arts located in Minneapolis. For more on Erdrich and her bookstore, read “Best-Selling Booksellers” by Lynn Rosen in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“When I would picture my life as a writer, I would picture myself sitting peacefully at a desk, with words and ideas and stories just drifting down into my brain.” For a performance with the Monti, Belle Boggs describes the transformation of her perspectives on writing, teaching, happiness, and California. Boggs’s debut memoir, The Art of Waiting: On Fertility, Medicine, and Motherhood (Graywolf Press, 2016), is featured in “Nine More New Memoirs” in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“To be a stranger is to be looked at, but to be black is to be looked at especially.” Listen to writer, photographer, and art historian Teju Cole read “Black Body” from his new essay collection, Known and Strange Things (Random House, 2016). Cole is featured in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine in “Love and Witness” by Kevin Nance.

Elizabeth Lesser shares her hopes to inspire readers through her new memoir, Marrow: A Love Story (Harper Wave, 2016), “to bring life, and forgiveness, and joy” to our most important relationships. Marrow is featured in “Nine More New Memoirs” in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“The sentence was appealing, not only because it followed me from place to place, but also because it seemed to think about me. ‘How can I jog your memory?’ it seemed to ask.” In this video, Renee Gladman reads her work for the BathHouse Events Series at Eastern Michigan University's Creative Writing Program in 2008. Gladman’s new essay collection, Calamities (Wave Books, 2016), is featured in Page One in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“It took me a very long time to learn how to write about Colombia.” At the 2015 National Book Festival, Juan Gabriel Vásquez speaks with PBS NewHour’s Jeffrey Brown about his literary influences and journey to write stories about Colombia, where he was born. Vásquez’s fourth novel, Reputations (Riverhead Books, 2016), is featured in Page One in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“What’s usually called inspiration…where that comes from, for me, is literature. The immersion in literature.” In this video, William Giraldi, author of the new memoir, The Hero's Body (Liveright, 2016), speaks about his relationship to the classics he's read and how this informs his writing. Giraldi talks about the craft of memoir with Sven Birkerts, author of The Art of Time in Memoir: Then, Again (Graywolf, 2007), in "Pay Attention" in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“Even when I’m writing for young people, I really try to get into the emotional side of who they are...” At the 2016 National Book Festival, Jacqueline Woodson discusses her novel Another Brooklyn (HarperCollins, 2016), which is shortlisted for the 2016 National Book Award in fiction. Woodson is featured in “A Great Good” by Rigoberto González in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

Teju Cole reads from his novel Open City (Random House, 2012) while accepting the 2015 Windham Campbell Prize for Fiction. Cole speaks about his collection of essays, Known and Strange Things (Random House, 2016), in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.