[Yale-readings] March 15 at 7pm : Michael Alenyikov and Daniel Swift

[Kuhl, Nancy]

Ordinary Evening Reading Series Welcomes
Michael Alenyikov and Daniel Swift, March 15 at 7pm - Anchor Bar

Celebrate the newness of things when Ordinary Evening Reading Series presents readings by two writers with celebrated new books-fiction writer Michael Alenyikov and non-fiction author Daniel Swift-at 7PM on Tuesday, March 15, in the Anchor Bar's Mermaid Room, 272 College Street in New Haven.

Ivan calls at three.  "Meet me at the Odessa," he says. "Thirty minutes.  You won't regret it.  I've got this idea."

            "But," I say.  I don't know what else to say so I say "but" again.  I'm standing naked, water dripping on the white carpet in a circle, me in the center.  "Okay," I say. "But first, Ive, where are you?"

            Geography is not a minor detail with my Ivan.  He's a little bit bipolar and drives a cab.  He is fearless and will go anywhere with a fare: Poughkeepsie, Newark, Hoboken, Harlem, Philadelphia, Coney Island--to him they are all the same.  And his mind takes ideas and travels to places I cannot reach.  He schemes for riches to share with me; he has dreams of a better world for all mankind, which is wonderful, but too often to count they have taken him to Bellevue, and once he was found shot and left for dead in front of the Brooklyn Museum.  When Ivan bleeds, so do I.  When we were very young, Louie, our father, would say, "The whole is greater than the sum of its parts," tapping each of us in turn on the head with his gold-plated fountain pen.

-          from Ivan and Misha by Michael Alenyikov


One afternoon in Münster, my interpreter took me to visit two sisters who had been teenagers in the war, and in their proper life they tried not to think too much of the bombing, but its terrors had not quite left them.

The older sister has put some books out.... She asks how old my grandfather was when he died. He was thirty, I say, and they grimace; that is too young. A little later, they tell me about their cousin, who was a pilot in one of the night-fighter squadrons, and who was killed. After, nobody mentioned him. Last year, the older one tells me, they talked about the war for the first time, and a couple of weeks ago, when they knew I was going to come and ask about the bombing, the younger one had the nightmares again, which she had not had for years.

They laugh, these two women, at their stories, and there are photographs of one, the older, in a nurse's uniform, and she is laughing then too.

-          From Bomber County by Daniel Swift
Michael Alenyikov's first book, Ivan and Misha, was "Highly Recommended" by the Library Journal, while Booklist praised its "sweetness, compassion, and great beauty." Michael's short stories have appeared in Canada's Descant, The Georgia Review, the James White Review, New York Stories, and Modern Words. They have been anthologized in Best Gay Stories, 2008 and Tartts Four: Incisive Fiction from Emerging Writers. His essays have appeared in The Gay & Lesbian Review. A MacDowell Fellow, Michael was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2007. He has worked as a bookstore clerk, clinical psychologist, cab driver, and interactive media writer, and lives in San Francisco.

Bomber County, Daniel Swift's first book, has been reviewed in the Times Literary Supplement and The Guardian, among others. The New York Times called the book, Daniel's account of his lost bomber pilot grandfather interwoven with the poetry of the World War II aviators, "a freewheeling exploration elegantly spiraling from the airborne Icarus to the husk of Cologne." Daniel teaches in the English department at Skidmore College, and his essays and reviews have appeared in the New York Times Book Review, the Guardian, Bookforum, and the Nation. Born in the U.K. and educated at Oxford and Columbia, he lives in New York City.

This season's lineup offers an eclectic mix of poetry, fiction, and non-fiction read by the authors. Our storm-canceled reading by Annie Murphy Paul and Carl Zimmer will take place on April 5th, and on April 26th, we welcome Gail Mazur and Eleanor Lerman. Check our website for author biographies, links to samples of their work, and other information: http://ordinaryevening.blogspot.com/.
ABOUT THE ORDINARY EVENING SERIES
The Ordinary Evening Reading Series presents readings by poets, novelists, and non-fiction writers. We welcome drinkers and teetotalers alike and hope you can join us for what the New Haven Independent called "one of those unofficial civic ventures that make New Haven such a vibrant place."
 Read writers' biographies, find links to more writing, send us an email, and more at http://www.ordinaryevening.blogspot.com<http://www.ordinaryevening.blogspot.com/>.

The Yale-Readings Listserv is sponsored by the Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. To post announcements about poetry and fiction readings, send the full text of the announcement, including contact information, to nancy.kuhl at yale.edu.<http://mailman.yale.edu/mailman/listinfo/yale-readings> Messages sent directly to the Yale-Readings list may not be posted.

For more information about Poetry at the Beinecke Library, visit: https://beineckepoetry.wordpress.com


--
http://ordinaryevening.blogspot.com/
To unsubscribe from this mailing, simply reply with the word REMOVE in the subject line.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.yale.edu/pipermail/yale-readings/attachments/20110222/821f7cec/attachment-0001.html