Friday, April 4, 2014

Larissa Szporluk Reading

What: Larissa Szporluk Poetry Reading and Discussion
Date: Thursday, 10 April 2014
Time: 6:00pm – 7:15pm
Location: Case Western Reserve University Room: Clark Hall, Room 206 (map)

Join us for an evening of poetry with Larissa Szporluk, which will be the final event of the semester for the Poets of Ohio reading series.

Szporluk will read from her most recent collection Traffic with MacBeth (Tupelo Press, 2011), as well as other work. Her performance will be followed by a question-and-answer session.

The event is free and open to the public. This and previous readings have been made possible by the support of the Helen B. Sharnoff Committee, the Baker-Nord Center for the Humanities, as well as the English and SAGES Departments.

It would be very much appreciated if you could spread this announcement and/or word of the event over the course of the next few days.

Larissa Szporluk was raised in Ann Arbor, Michigan and earned degrees at the University of Michigan, the University of California-Berkeley, and the University of Virginia, where she was a Henry Hoyns fellow. Her books of poetry include Dark Sky Question (1998), which won the Barnard Poetry Prize; Isolato (2000), winner of the Iowa Poetry Prize; The Wind, Master Cherry, the Wind (2003); Embryos and Idiots (2007); and Traffic with Macbeth (2011). She has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, and currently teaches at Bowling Green State University.

UPDATE: 04 APRIL 2014

For next class session, please read Larissa Szporluk's Traffic with MacBeth (Tupelo Press, 2011) and be prepared to discuss the collection.

Additionally, you will need to turn in a hard-copy of a typed, two-page, double-space response to the book. Your response essay should engage Szporluk's book using one of the critical articles, essays, or chapters we've read so far this semester. To do so, please look at how writers such as Stephen Burt, Richard Hugo, Philip Larkin, James Longenbach, Richard Archambeau, or Elisa Gabbert critically engage with a poem. Think of their writing as a model for how you can approach Szporluk's book. Ultimately, you'll want to provide a close reading of one of two poems in the collection that are emblematic of Traffic with MacBeth's broader concerns or aesthetic traits.

In addition to being two-pages, double-spaced and typed, your responses should be in 12-point Times New Roman font with standard one inch margins. Your name should appear in the top, right-hand corner and the essay should be formatted according to MLA-stlye guidelines. To this end, you should be properly quoting both Szporluk's book and at least one of the articles.

By Wednesday 26 March at 12pm, everyone should email three questions that they would like to ask Szporluk after her reading. These questions should engage her poems and the critical readings directly; moreover, they should be formed in such a manner that they will prompt extended discussion, not just "Yes" or "No" answers. I will read over your questions and provide feedback for how they can be improved. You will be expected to ask all the poets questions after their readings.

On Tuesday 18 March, instead of having a regular class session, Larissa Szporluk will be reading. I will provide more information regarding the reading over spring break via email.