Kore Press is excited to announce that we have received an NEA grant to host the first ever Big Read project in Tucson this fall!
The Big Read is a program of the National Endowment for the Arts, designed to restore reading to the center of American culture. The NEA presents The Big Read in partnership with Arts Midwest. The Big Read brings together partners across the country to encourage reading for pleasure and enlightenment. It provides citizens with the opportunity to read and discuss a single book within their communities.
Kore has chosen to celebrate the poetry of Emily Dickinson, and bring her visionary work and inspiring life's story to our community in innovative and meaningful ways. Together with 40 partners, Kore's Big Read will present creative community programming taking place from September 22 to December 10, 2011.
For questions or further information, email Programming Assistant Miranda Butler at kore@korepress.org.
The Poetry Center’s special collection library will offer creative, hands-on field trips centered on the genius of Emily Dickinson, with curricula that meets Arizona State Standards and encourages a lifelong love of writing and literature. Field trips and tours for grades K-12 are available on Fridays, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Please give us four weeks noticein advance for planning your field trip and 24 hours notice on cancellations.
Sept. 22 - Dec. 10, 2011
Participating Tucson and Surrounding Area Schools
Dickinson in the curriculum
To date, the following schools will work with the poetry of Emily Dickinson in Creative Writing, Humanities, Art, and Foreign Language classes: Tucson High School, City High School, University High School, Catalina Foothills High School, Marana High School, Amphi High School, TMA School, and Sells Middle School.
An Evening of Dickinson inspired performances with New ARTiculations, Katherine Ferrier of The Architects, and Vicki Brown
Tickets $10 in advance, $15 at the door, $40 for VIP seating and reception
Evening length performance of Emily Dickinson inspired dances by New ARTiculations Dance Theater (a series of solos and an ensemble piece); with Katherine Ferrier (of The Architects) and new musical compositions by Vicki Brown.
Note: advanced ticket sales end at midnight Nov. 11, the day before the event. Tickets can be purchased for $15 at the door on the day of the event.
Nov. 19, 2011 from 9 a.m. - 1:30 p.m.
Himmel Park library lawn
Dickinson Tribute Chess Tournament with 9 Queens
Three rounds of chess held outdoors to celebrate Dickinson’s sometimes puzzle-like poems and love of the garden. The tournament also features poetry readings between matches and Dickinson-inspired prizes. Lunch will be served.
Nov. 20, 2011 from 2 - 4 p.m.
Tucson High School Auditorium
Community & Youth showcase, $5
Performances by Stories That Soar! based on writing generated by the community and students, Slamming Emily poets, works in translation and more.
Dec. 10, 2011
Party for Emily
Second Saturday, Downtown
To celebrate Emily Dickinson's birthday and close out our Big Read Tucson, we will host a public party to share the highlights from the 10-weeks. Check back for updated details about our final showcase event and the exciting conclusion to our Big Read programming.
September - December, 2011
Roving Tucson Events
The life and work of Emily Dickinson
During the 10-weeks of Big Read Tucson, Public libraries will host reading/discussions and writing workshops led by MFA students and community poets. Poems will appear on Sun Tran Buses and projected onto buildings at night. 21st c. Emily D portraits will be created by area artists and high school students. A Dickinson mural will be painted on a prominent public wall downtown. Tucson's pastry chefs will present their signature version of a Dickinson recipe. Tucson readers will present Dickinson poems or letters, 3-mintes at a time, to the City Council every Tuesday. Check our website and find us on Facebook and Twitter for scheduling and programming updates, including where you can find the semi-weekly Pop-Up Emily event.
Past Events
Sept. 16, 11:30 a.m. - 3 p.m.
Hotel Congress stage
Reading Emily Out Loud
You are invited to participate in the first recording session of Reading Emily Out Loud, at The Hotel Congress. We will be capturing the sounds of Tucson, and some folks from afar, reading Emily Dickinson. Got a fave poem, fragment or letter, a killer first line that blows your kilt up? Come on down to Ho Co and let us hear you speak some Dickinson. Plus, it's fun to sit on stage in front of a mic. Contact: Drew Burk, drew.burk@sporkpress.com or 520-302-5327. You can see all first lines, here, with links to full poems:
Sept. 22, at 7 p.m.
Charles Alexander keynote lecture & reading at the UA Poetry Center
Dickinson Dancing
Presented with support from Poets & Writers
In this lecture, poet and publisher Charles Alexander takes us through a close listening of the music of Emily Dickinson’s work by reading specific poems, such as “My Life had Stood a Loaded Gun” and “I cannot live with you.” He will share Dickinson’s vision of passion, grace, and sometimes despair, and will discuss Dickinson as being both in and of her time (the period of the American Civil War), and far ahead of her time. Finally, Alexander will represent this fiery, lively, intense worker in words to be anything but the retiring and hermitic belle of Amherst. She was, instead, a female and feminist pioneer who created her own identity, one that continues to attract and mystify readers.
Oct. 1, 2011 from 6 - 8 p.m.
MAST art gallery at 299 S. Park Ave.
For the Love of Libraries benefit for Miles and Tucson High libraries
Student reading
Samantha Neville, a Tucson High School student, will perform her translations of Dickinson poems in Spanish. Reading will take place amidst a craft sale/fundraiser for the Tucson High and Miles Elementary School libraries.
Oct. 5, 2011 from 2 - 3:30 p.m.
Tucson High Magnet School Library
Slamming Emily workshops - free!
Emily Dickinson like you've never heard her before--poetry slam style! Come check out this free writing and performance workshop with Logan Phillips of the infamous Tucson Youth Poetry Slam (TYPS)! Open to all youth ages 13-19. Email kore@korepress.org to register!
This special exhibit coincides with the Kore Press Emily Dickinson Big Read. "Visions and Versions of Emily Dickinson"features treasured Dickinson volumes from the Poetry Center’s Rare Book Room along with stunning linguistic and visual interpretations of the poet and her legacy.
On display will be Dickinson’s herbarium, facsimiles of her manuscripts, some early (Second and Third Series) publications from the Rare Book Room, and a gorgeous artist book by Jen Bervin.
Chef Doug Levy of Feast will be presenting his rendition of an Emily Dickinson recipe for dessert on the October Feast menu. A poem is served with each portion!
Oct. 12, 2011 from 4 - 5:30 p.m.
Sam Lena South Tucson Branch Library
Slamming Emily workshops - free!
Emily Dickinson like you've never heard her before--poetry slam style! Come check out this free writing and performance workshop with Logan Phillips of the infamous Tucson Youth Poetry Slam (TYPS)! Open to all youth ages 13-19. Email kore@korepress.org to register!
Oct. 15, 2011 from 3:30 - 5 p.m.
Himmel Park Library
Slamming Emily workshops - free!
Emily Dickinson like you've never heard her before—poetry slam style! Come check out this free writing and performance workshop with Logan Phillips of the infamous Tucson Youth Poetry Slam (TYPS)! Open to all youth ages 13-19.Email kore@korepress.org to register!
Bentley's House of Coffee and tea hosts a slam for Emily Dickinson poets, alongside TYPS competition. 3-5 Slamming Emily finalists will perform at the final showcase on November 20. More details coming soon!
Oct 15, 2011 from 10 a.m. - noon
A glee possesseth me: Making Dance out of Poem
workshop at the Movement Shala, $15
Join dancer/writer Kimi Eisele and poet/publisher Lisa Bowden for a journey through Emily Dickinson's poetry using movement and writing exercises. Invigorate your own writing, learn more about the process choreographers sometimes use to create dances, get a little exercise, and gain a deeper understanding of Ms. Dickinson's poetry. Suitable for people of all ages and abilities. No prior dance experience necessary. This workshop also serves as a sneak peek at the creative process used by New ARTiculations for the Nov. 12 performance.
This three-hour workshop explores writing strategies inspired by Dickinson's experiments in language. As Dickinson made poems out of her reading, we will investigate the possibilities for reading (and playing with) Dickinson's poems as a way of generating our own poems.
Oct. 20, 2011 from 1-2 p.m.
Woods Library
Slamming Emily workshops - free!
Emily Dickinson like you've never heard her before—poetry slam style! Come check out this free writing and performance workshop with Logan Phillips of the infamous Tucson Youth Poetry Slam (TYPS)! Open to all youth ages 13-19. Email kore@korepress.org to register!
A Certain Slant of Light: The Dickinson Inspired Installation Art of Barbara Penn
Slide Show & Art Talk
UA Art Professor Barbara Penn will give a slide show and talk about her body of work from the 90s based on Emily Dickinson. "Prompted by the poetry and biography of Emily Dickinson and other poets, I turned to installations and combined media in the 1990's. This work was more formal yet there were always surprises to work with as I moved parts and pieces around. In this exploration of Victorian life and language, I found things that paralleled my own life and stimulated the development of my political, psychological and feminist ideas. Regularly I would place letters and words into these arrangements of objects, image and space." Suggested $5 donation.
The Presence of Dickinson in the Art of Joseph Cornell, Lesley Dill, and Roni Horn
An art talk with international scholar Eva Heisler
Eva Heisler (from the University of Maryland University College, European Division, in Heidelberg, Germany) will present on works by Joseph Cornell, Lesley Dill, and Roni Horn and explore the different ways Dickinson’s life and poetry have inspired visual artists. Cornell’s box-constructions mirror the material practices of Dickinson. Dill’s works on paper, sculptures, and performance pieces evoke the constraints of gender on Dickinson's voice. Horn’s sculptures harness the syntactical eccentricities of Dickinson’s poems in the service of the artist’s preoccupation with doubles and temporal experience. This discussion of Dickinson-inflected work examines how Dickinson’s lyric impulses “materialize” in art and raises questions about the experience of “reading” Dickinson while viewing art.Suggested $5 donation.
A conversation with poets & visual/vocal artists, and you, about challenges that arise when creating pieces with literary works that have tremendous force and resonance. Dickinson made use of the writings of others—how do writers/artists make use of her work, or other powerful texts, without being overtaken by it? We will hear from those who grapple with this issue or who have been influenced by Dickinson in other ways. Suggested $5 donation.
ANNE WALDMAN (poet) & NOAH SATERSTROM (collaborating
artist)
$5 / $3 students
Anne Waldman reading from her poems & Noah Saterstrom talking about his
artistic collaboration with Anne Waldman
Featuring reading from the new CHAX PRESS chapbook by Anne Waldman,
Femanifesto, and from Soldiering and The Iovis Trilogy. There will be a
reception for the current exhibition, a work of art by Noah Saterstrom, in
collaboration with a poem by Anne Waldman, before the reading, from 5pm to
7pm. The reading will be followed by a question & answer session with the
audience.
Anne Waldman is a poet, professor, performer, cultural activist, and the
author of many books of poetry, prose, and poetics, including the recent
books Feminafesto, A Vow to Poetry, In the Room of Never Grieve: New and
Selected Poems 1985-2003, Manatee/Humanity, and The Ioviis Trilogy: Colors
in the Mechanism of Concealment. She co-founded the Jack Kerouac School of
Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado.
Noah Saterstrom is a Tucson-based painter and and the founder/curator of the
cross-genre arts journal Trickhouse.
Reading through Emily Dickinson's poems, we will consider our own "ethopoetics" and what "nibbles at the soul." We will engage in several "experiments of attention," utilizing montage, dream, "story," collaboration, and a form of modal structure. Waldman will discuss her own praxis and composition in relation to her books: Manatee/Humanity (Penguin Poets, 2009) and The Iovis Trilogy: Colors in the Mechanism of Concealment (Coffee House Press, 2011).
Some familiarity with Dickinson's and Waldman's work is helpful but not necessary.
Oct. 30, 2011 at 3 p.m.
KXCI – 91.3 FM
My Sad Pony, An All Souls radio broadcast
Jane Miller & Lisa Bowden talk with Amanda Shauger about Dickinson, The Big Read, and Miller's latest poems.
A lecture by UA Professor Susan Aiken that explores Dickinson's subversive play with gender in poems that question her culture's dominant assumptions about both women and poetry. Dr Aiken will place Dickinson within her historical context and talk about her poetics of resistance: her nuanced, witty, and subversive critique of dominant conceptions of gender, women, and poetry.
Suggested $5 donation.
Like Kore Press on Facebook and follow us on Twitter!
Questions? Comments? Looking for more information or a media contact? Email Web Master & Programming Assistant Miranda Butler at kore@korepress.org.
