Thurs-Sat, 3 Nights: AWP Offsite Readings @ the PRB

The annual Association of Writers & Writing Programs (AWP) conference holds court in Los Angeles this year, which means 7000-some writers descending upon the city for the weekend, and gads of events peppered all over Downtown and environs in every bar, cat condo and project space that can fit scribblers and the poetariat in.

As ever, the Poetic Research Bureau raises its crooked flag, scatters the chairs, warms up the PA, and becomes Chinatown's own living room for mutterers and guessworkers in the unguarded arts. Come sit under the paper lamps of Chung King Rd for what looks to be very merciful weather, and succumb to the numerate vertigo of:

Three nights, six events, eighteen presses, and sixty writers!

We'll also have a video interview station with Caleb Beckwith, Ching-in Chen, Houston Donham and Kate Robinson interviewing writers and participants throughout the nights' events.

Thursday, March 31

7pm: Black Radish, eohippus labs, Staging Ground & Tinfish
Sponsored by Small Press Distribution

Black Radish (Tim Dyke, Deborah Meadows, Julia Wieting, Donovan Kuhio Colleps), Tinfish (Carrie Hunter, Sarah Mangold, Valerie Witte, David James Miller, Daniel Tiffany and Brittany Billmeyer-Finn), eohippus labs (Eireene Nealand, Janice Lee, Michelle Detorie, and Allison Carter), Staging Ground (Will Alexander)

9pm: Station Hill presents “ledge it glow”: A Celebration of Clark Coolidge’s Selected Poems: 1962-1985

This group reading celebrates the publication of Clark Coolidge’s Selected Poems: 1962-1985, published (fall 2016 release) by Station Hill Press. Advance copies will be available at the reading. The readers will include, among others, Brandon Downing, Johanna Drucker, Andrew Maxwell,  Jerome Rothenberg, Michael Ruby, Tom Trudgeon, Sam Truitt and Diane Ward.  

Friday, April 1

7pm: Krupskaya, Nightboat & Wonder
Sponsored by Small Press Distribution

Krupskaya (Syd Staiti, Eric Sneathen), Nightboat (Vi Khi Nao, Orlando White and Brenda Iijima, Melissa Buzzeo), Wonder (Kate Durbin, Mathew Timmons, Josef Kaplan)

9pm: Image Text Ithaca, Kelsey St. Press & Poor Claudia

Poor Claudia (Claire Donato, Jamalieh Haley, Greg Purcell), Kelsey St. Press (Jennifer Pilch, Mg Roberts, Anna Morrison and Sueyeun Juliette Lee), Image Text Ithaca (John Keene, Catherine Taylor and Matvei Yankelevich, + Claudia Rankine video)

Saturday, April 2

7pm: Dorothy, Essay Press, Siglio & UDP
Sponsored by Small Press Distribution

UDP (Jen Hofer, A Maxwell), Siglio (Danielle Dutton, Richard Kraft & Joe Biel), Dorothy (Amina Cain, Joanna Ruocco), Essay Press (Ben + Sandra Doller, Jenny Boully)

9pm: 1913 Press, Insert Blanc & Les Figues

1913 Press (Cynthia Arrieu-King, Leif Haven, Ronaldo Wilson), Insert Blanc Press (Divya Victor, Joseph Mosconi, Kevin Mcpherson Eckhoff), Les Figues (Michael du Plessis, Chris Tysh, Sean Pessin) and Sophia Le Fraga.

 * * *

Events always free.

Poetic Research Bureau
951 Chung King Rd
Chinatown, Los Angeles

March 16-19: After Mingus – Improvising the Mingus School

Improvising the Mingus School: Session One, March 16-­19 2016 : The Jazz Workshop for Radical Poetics / We done worked a Root

WEDNESDAY 3/16 : Listening as a form

6:30 – 8:30pm With Fred Moten, Harmony Holiday, Feliz Molina, Pablo Lopez, and some raw coconuts on deck

Close listening to Nesuhi Ertegun’s interview with Mingus along with LPs :

• Black Saint and the Sinner Lady

• Ah, Um

• We Insist! Freedom Now Suite (Max Roach, Abbey Lincoln)

• Black Spirits (Amiri Baraka)

Thursday 3/17

6 – 8pm

Screening: Life is a Saxophone (Documentary on LA poet Kamau Daaood­)

Discussion of Horace Tapscott and Post Central Ave Jazz heyday Collectives, Community Theater, Jazz and Poetics working together in Black Arts and the telos from then to now’s iterations in the form of albums like Kendrick Lamar’s most recent.


Friday 3/18

5 – 8pm

Mingus Sessions with Paul Vangelisti, workshop and listening


Saturday 3/19

6 – 8pm

Screening of Jackie McLean’s Life on Mars

Sun Ra Listening Session post and Mythscience Impossible Events ephemera showing