Monday, April 25, 2011

On the LAHM ...

New Works by Louis Armstrong/MFA Writers-in-Residence:
Brian Kim and Melissa Bobe
Friday, May 6th
6:30 pm
Louis Armstrong House Museum (LAHM)
34-56 107th Street, Corona, NY 11368
www.louisarmstronghouse.org, 718-478-8274

Join us for a wonderful evening of readings by our program’s third Louis Armstrong/ Queens College MFA Writers-in-Residence in the beautiful garden of the Louis Armstrong House Museum. In case of rain, reading will be moved inside. Writers will be reading from new works that were created in response to the Armstrong House Museum & Archives, which houses Armstrong’s recordings, films, letters, photographs, and collages in a world renowned collection.

Saturday, April 23, 2011

The PEN World Voices Festival // SLAM

Join current MFA student, Jolie Hale, at the Translation Slam on Friday, April 29th: the Bowery Poetry Club (308 Bowery) from 7-8:30 pm.

Here's how the slam works: PEN invites two writers from foreign languages, and they submit short texts to be translated. This year the languages are French and Urdu. Two translators are assigned to each text. The translators work independently of each other to produce the best translation they can. On the night of the slam, the translators compare their work and discuss their choices. Audience participation is essential, so if you can make it, feel free to jump into the debate!

This is a ticketed event ($5 for PEN members and those with a student ID, $10 for everybody else), and you can get tickets online ahead of time or simply pay at the door. There's a cocktail hour reading at Bowery Poetry Club before the slam; you can attend both events for $10/$15. The Best Translated Book Awards, which is free, will follow the slam.
Pre-paid tickets here: http://www.pen.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5720/prmID/2126
Full Festival schedule here: http://www.pen.org/page.php/prmID/2108

Revolutionaries in the Arab World
When: Wednesday, April 27
Where: 92nd Street Y, Unterberg Poetry Center, 1395 Lexington Ave., New York City
What time: 7:30 p.m.

China in Two Acts
When: Thursday, April 28
Where: The Cooper Union, Great Hall, 7 E. 7th St. , New York City
What time: 7 p.m.

WikiLeaks
When: Thursday, April 28
Where: The Cooper Union, Great Hall, 7 E. 7th St. , New York City
What time: 9:15 p.m.

Poetry: The Second Skin
When: Friday, April 29
Where: 92nd Street Y, Unterberg Poetry Center, 1395 Lexington Ave., New York City
What time: 7:30 p.m.

Get Super Lit: Comic Books Come Alive on Stage
When: Saturday, April 30
Where: The Cooper Union, Frederick P. Rose Auditorium, 41 Cooper Sq., New York City
What time: 12–1:30 p.m.

American Exile: The Prison Industry
When: Saturday, April 30
Where: The Cooper Union, Frederick P. Rose Auditorium, 41 Cooper Sq., New York City
What time: 2–3:30 p.m.

In Conversation: Vladimir Sorokin and Keith Gessen
When: Saturday, April 30
Where: The Cooper Union, Frederick P. Rose Auditorium, 41 Cooper Sq., New York City
What time: 4:30–6 p.m.


Vladimir Sorokin: Ice Trilogy (Play Reading)
When: Saturday, April 30
Where: Old Gym, 268 Mulberry St., New York City
What time: 7 p.m.

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

**Celebrate the Borough of Queens**


Tuesday May 3, 6:30pm, Godwin-Ternbach Museum: A Reading --and Book Launch-- from the just published anthology Forgotten Borough, writers come to terms with Queens. (Readers include past and present MFA faculty too.)

**Double-Reading**

Christoph Keller and Jan Heller Levi
Wednesday April 27, 6:30pm
Godwin-Ternbach Museum, 4th Floor, Klapper Hall
Queens College campus ...
Christoph Keller is a Swiss-born, NYC-based novelist, memoirist, playwright and essayist. His memoir Der beste Tänzer (The Best Dancer) spent six weeks on the Swiss bestseller list and was translated into English in 2008. Thrice, he has been awarded the Pro Helvetia grant, the Swiss equivalent of an NEA grant. In the US, Keller’s work in multiple genres has appeared in The Paris Review, Gobshite Quarterly, Two Lines, The Means, Failbetter Absinthe, New European Writing and Threepenny Review, among others. He is currently working on his first novel in English, River Madness. He lives in Manhattan with his wife, the poet Jan Heller Levi.

Jan Heller Levi is the author of two books of poetry, Once I Gazed at You in Wonder, (winner of the Walt Whitman Award of the Academy of American Poets) and Skyspeak. She is also the editor of A Muriel Rukeyser Reader, consulting editor on the 2005 re-issue of The Collected Poems of Muriel Rukeyser, and co-editor, with Sara Miles, of Directed by Desire: The Collected Poems of June Jordan. Levi is married to the Swiss-born novelist and playwright Christoph Keller; and makes her home in New York City, where she is a member of the faculty of the MFA Program at Hunter College.

Monday, April 11, 2011

A Celebration of National Poetry Month

A Celebration of Poetry Month with Billy Collins and --
four other CUNY poets, Kimiko Hahn of Queens College, L.S. Asekoff of Brooklyn College, Tom Sleigh of Hunter College and another of Lehman’s own, George Green.

At the Lovinger Theater on April 14th at 12:30 p.m.
Introductions by Salita Bryant, Department of English, Lehman College.
Address
Lehman College, The City University of New York
250 Bedford Park Blvd. West
Bronx, NY

2011 Literary Arts Festival Reading by Sapphire

Sapphire's novel Push (1996) won the Book-of-the-Month Club's Stephen Crane Award for First Fiction, the Black Caucus of the American Library Association's First Novelist Award, and in Great Britain, the Mind Book of the Year Award. Precious received the Academy Award for Best Screenplay and Best Supporting Actress, in addition to the Grand Jury Prize and Audience Awards in the U.S. Dramatic Competition at Sundance. Her long-awaited second novel, The Kid, will be published by Penguin in April. Sapphire is also the author of two collections of poetry.... Plus she is an alum from Brooklyn College's MFA Program in Creative Writing.
April 12, 2011
5:45 PM – 8:00 PM
@
New York City College of Technology
Klitgord Center, 285 Jay St., Brooklyn
718.260.5394
Admission: Free

Christoph Keller and Jan Heller Levi Read New Work

The MFA Program in Creative Writing & Literary Translation
Reading Series Spring 2011
Christoph Keller and Jan Heller Levi Read New Work
Wednesday April 27, 6:30 pm
Godwin-Ternbach Museum, 4th Floor, Klapper Hall

Christoph Keller is a Swiss-born, New York City-based novelist, memoirist, playwright and essayist. His memoir Der beste Tänzer (The Best Dancer) spent six weeks on the Swiss bestseller list and was translated into English in 2008. Thrice, he has been awarded the Pro Helvetia grant, the Swiss equivalent of an NEA grant. In the US, Keller’s work in multiple genres has appeared in The Paris Review, Gobshite Quarterly, Two Lines, The Means, Failbetter Absinthe, New European Writing and Threepenny Review, among others. He is currently working on his first novel in English, River Madness. He lives in Manhattan with his wife, the poet Jan Heller Levi.

Jan Heller Levi is the author of two books of poetry, Once I Gazed at You in Wonder, (winner of the Walt Whitman Award of the Academy of American Poets) and Skyspeak. She is also the editor of A Muriel Rukeyser Reader, consulting editor on the 2005 re-issue of The Collected Poems of Muriel Rukeyser, and co-editor, with Sara Miles, of Directed by Desire: The Collected Poems of June Jordan. Levi is married to the Swiss-born novelist and playwright Christoph Keller; and makes her home in New York City, where she is a member of the faculty of the MFA Program at Hunter College.

A reception will follow the reading, and books will be for sale.
Contact MFA Director Nicole Cooley at ncooley@qc.edu for more

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

ALUM, John Reid Currie, READING & OPEN MIC

Come out to Queens this Sunday afternoon for a reading by John Currie: open mic, John (around 3 pm) then more open mic.

John Reid Currie was writer in residence at the Louis Armstrong Museum and Archives in 2009 and has performed at The Cathedral of St. John the Divine, Earshot, The Nuyorican Poets Café, the Turnstyle Reading Series and Smalls Jazz Club. He has taught hand papermaking at the American Museum of Natural History, the New York Public Library and other venues throughout New York City. Mr. Currie’s poetry is featured in “Greenwich Village,” published by St. Martin’s Griffen and a profile of his educational work can be found in “Green At Work” published by Island Press.

All welcome to participate in this free open mic poetry event.
Sunday, April 10 2:00 p.m. Central Library Auditorium
89-11 Merrick Boulevard, Jamaica, QUEENS
718-990-0700
Train: Take F train to the 169th Street station. Bus: Numerous buses go to the 165th Street Bus Terminal.

Sunday, April 3, 2011

{{{LAST TURNSTYLE OF THE SEASON}}}

FINAL reading of the Spring 2011 Turnstyle Reading Series. The reading will take place on Thursday, April 7th in the Segal Theater at the Center for Humanities, located at 365 5th Avenue at 34th Street in Manhattan. The readings start at 6:30pm sharp, and tend to be very well attended. We welcome you to come and to invite all of your friends.

Turnstyle is a Mixer designed to bring together the talented MFA students from CUNY’s four creative writing MFA programs: Queens, City, Hunter, and Brooklyn. Each night, two students from each campus read alongside two members of the faculty. The series is co-sponsored by the Creative Writing Affiliation Group, The Center for the Humanities, and the Office of Academic Affairs. Turnstyle is now in its third year.

The readers will be:

Victoria Brown,
Jessie Male,
Sonia Valdiviezo,
Jessie Chaffee,
Gracie Leavitt,
Dana Collins
Jolie Hale,
Lysette Simmons

Robert Viscusi,
Kathryn Harrison

We hope to see you there!