Throughout the year, the Poetry Initiative will host a range of activities for poets and for lovers of poetry throughout the state. With its many partnerships with organizations and institutions around South Carolina, the Poetry Initiative organizes, supports and promotes events that range from small workshops to high profile events like the annual SC Poets' Summit.
Event: Movin' with Poetry: Children's Poetry Workshop
Date: Saturday, March 29th, 2008
Time: 10:00 am – 11:30 am
ages 8-12
Place: Children's Room Manager
Richland County Public Library
1431 Assembly Street
Columbia, S.C. 29201
Poets from the South Carolina Poetry Initiative will feature a hands-on poetry workshop as a means for blending eye, word, and story. Using such tools as books in verse, illustrations, art supplies, and pen and paper, young bards will experience how the imagination can be moved into spaces that explore both the real and make believe world!
Event: United in This Way: Master Class Led by Poet Li-Young Lee
Lunch and Master Class with Poet Li-Young Lee
Date: Friday, March 28th, 2008
Time: 11:30 am- 1:30 pm
Place: Alumni House
University of South Carolina
1731 College Street
Corner of College Street and Barnwell Ave
(Across from USC’s Capstone Building)
Space is limited to 30 seats
Reserve Space by Contacting Charlene Spearen:
Tel: 777-5492 Email: cmspeare@gwm.sc.edu
Event: United in This Way: Reception and Reading Featuring Poet Li-Young Lee
Date: Friday, March 28th, 2008
Time: 6:30pm- 8:30pm
Place: Columbia Museum of Art
Corner of Main and Hampton Streets
Between two unknowns, I live my life.
Between my mother's hopes, older than I am
by coming before me. And my child's wishes, older than I am
by outliving me…
—Li-Young Lee
The evening’s agenda will feature a reception and public reading by world acclaimed poet Li-Young Lee; book signing to will follow. Lee’s books will be available for purchase. On display will be works of poetry and art inspired by specific pieces written by Li-Young Lee.
Pieces will have been created by University of South Carolina graduate and undergraduate students majoring in the Fine Arts: poetry, dance, and art. As a precursor for what will be a stellar reading by one of the most exciting poets of the 21st century, the audience will be treated to an exciting original dance choreographed and presented by University of South Carolina students majoring in Dance. Dancers will be in full costume and presentation will have been inspired by specific poems created by Li-Young Lee.
Behind My Eyes by Li-Young Lee
A highly anticipated collection from one of the most powerful voices at work in America today. Combining sensitivity and eloquence with a broad appeal, Li-Young Lee walks in the footsteps of Stanley Kunitz and Billy Collins as one of the most beloved poets in the US. Playful, erotic, at times mysterious, his work describes the immanent value of everyday experience. Straightforward language and simple narratives become gateways to the most powerful formulations of beauty, wisdom, and divine love.
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Event: United in This Way: Transfigured by Music
Date: Saturday, March 29, 2008
Time: 6:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Place: School of Music
University of South Carolina
Room 006
Assembly Street next to the Koger Center
*Light Reception and Event is Free and Open to the public.
Reception and brief talk led by Li-Young Lee discussing his poetry, Asian influences, and establishing elements of music in his work. This event is a precursor to a major public Gamelan Galak Tika concert which will be held in the School of Music’s Recital Hall. Concert begins at 7:30 p.m.
Event: A Cabaret of Words: A Poetry Reading Series
Date: Tuesday, April 1st, 2008
Time: 6:30 pm - 8:00 pm
Place: Richland County Public Library
Bostick Auditorium, Main Library
Assembly Street
Columbia, SC
*Event is Free and Open to the public
Lights. Action. Music. Featuring award winning poets and a multitude of voices,
the South Carolina Poetry Initiative will treat you to a night of words consuming words as poets from around the state showcase their talent in this writers series.
*Book Signing to follow Reading
Laurel Blossom is a prize-winning poet and her most recent book is Degrees of Latitude, a book-length narrative prose poem exploring the geography of a woman's life (). Earlier books include Wednesday: New and Selected Poems, The Papers Said, What's Wrong, and Any Minute, a chapbook, which was nominated for the Elliston Prize. Her work has appeared in a number of anthologies, including 180 More: Extraordinary Poems for Every Day (Billy Collins, editor) and in national journals including Poetry, The American Poetry Review, Pequod, The Paris Review, The Carolina Quarterly, among others.
Susan Meyers is active n the poetry societies of South Carolina and North Carolina, and is currently serving as president of Her book length collection, has been published by the after being selected by Terrance Hayes for the SC Poetry Initiative’s Poetry Book Prize. Keep and Give Away is also the winner of the Brockman-Campbell Book Award and the SIBA (Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance) Book Award for Poetry. Her work has appeared in The Southern Review, Crazyhorse, Tar River Poetry, Verse Daily, and other literary journals. Recent prizes include first place in the Yemassee and South Carolina Review poetry contests.
Steve Gardner (Co-edited with William Wright The Southern Poetry Anthology: South
Carolina, Texas Review Press, 2007)
Sarah Newman (University of South Carolina Second Year MFA Student)
Bhavin Tailor (University of South Carolina Second Year MFA Student)
Event: Poetry Initiative Director Kwame Dawes is named 2008 Elizabeth O’Neill Verner/Governor’s Awards for the Arts Recipient
Date: Wednesday, April 16th, 2008
Time: 9:15 am
Place: House Chambers at the Statehouse in Columbia
*The ceremony is free and open to the public
Event: South Carolina Poetry Initiative’s 2008 Chapbook Contest
The University of South Carolina's outreach organization, the South Carolina Poetry Initiative, is proud to announce its third annual chapbook contest. This contest seeks to introduce a series of five chapbooks to South Carolina’s book reading public. The South Carolina Initiative produces all five books by selected poets as a work of art, presenting each publication with a distinctive design, with beautiful print values, and as part of an exclusive numbered series. The publications will garner statewide attention for poetry through readings, a book launch, and other promotional activities. The winning chapbook series will be selected and edited by Kwame Dawes. Manuscripts will be published by Stepping Stones Press and will be distributed by the South Carolina Poetry Initiative.
Click here for contest guidelines and information.
Click for 2007 chapbook contest results.
© 2003.University of South Carolina.
