Archive for the ‘Events’ Category
Dallas Poetry Slam Youth Series
When: Every first Saturday at 4-6 pm
Where: Half Price Books, 5803 E. NW Highway, Program Room
Hosted by: Alexandra Marie and Joaquin Zihuatanejo
WordSpace is honored to partner with Dallas Poetry Slam to bring Poetry and Slam outreach to area youth for workshops and performance.
Youth Poets Workshops 1st and 3rd Saturdays
1st Saturdays: 4-6 pm @ Half Price Books, 5803 E. NW Highway
3rd Saturdays: 4-6 @ Oak Cliff Cultural Center, 223 W. Jefferson
Youth Poets Workshops is a component of WS Next Generation Project in support and development of young writers. WordSpace presents workshops mentored by top performance poet and Dallas Youth Poets Executive Director, Joaquin Zihuatanejo and co-founder Alexandra Marie Thurston. They provide poetry and slam outreach to area youth in two great locations. The workshops are open to ages 11-17. Participants receive instruction in writing and performance with a chance to compete for the Dallas Youth Poets sponsored team that will represent Dallas in the annual conference, Brave New Voices. The workshop participants are also eligible to compete in other area youth team competitions.
Joaquin Zihuatanejo (born in Dallas, Texas) is an award-winning American slam poet and teacher. In 2004, Zihuatanejo competed in the National Poetry Slam as part of the Dallas Poetry Slam team, which placed third. He also appeared on HBO’s Def Poetry in 2005. In 2008, he won the Individual World Poetry Slam and was the winner of the World Cup of Poetry Slam in 2009. Currently, Zihuatanejo resides near his hometown of Dallas with his wife and two daughters. Outside of poetry, Zihuatanejo taught English and creative writing for seven years.
Alexandra Marie Thurston, is a writer from Los Angeles and Director of the Dallas Poetry Slam. She bring years of service to the poetry community and inspiring mentorship to young writers. Alexandra Marie Thurston serves as the board of directors of WordSpace.
WordSpace is honored to partner with Oak Cliff Cultural Center to produce Youth Poets Workhops at their facility. Funding for this program is made possible by City of Dallas Office of Cultural Affairs and WordSpace Members.
Special Thanks to Half Price Books, sponsors of WordSpace at The Kessler, for use of their facilities for this program. WordSpace is also honored to be a 2014 recipient of TACA’s generosity.
Dallas Poetry Slam Youth Series
When: Every first Saturday at 4-6 pm
Where: Half Price Books, 5803 E. NW Highway, Program Room
Hosted by: Alexandra Marie and Joaquin Zihuatanejo
WordSpace is honored to partner with Dallas Poetry Slam to bring Poetry and Slam outreach to area youth for workshops and performance.
Dallas Poetry Slam Youth Series
When: Every first Saturday at 4-6 pm
Where: Half Price Books, 5803 E. NW Highway, Program Room-
Hosted by: Alexandra Marie and Joaquin Zihuatanejo
WordSpace is honored to partner with Dallas Poetry Slam to bring Poetry and Slam outreach to area youth for workshops and performance.
WordSpace presents Next Generation Project @ SMU Lit Fest
What: WordSpace presents Next Generation @ SMU LIT FEST 2014
Where: McCord Auditorium
When: Wednesday, March 19, 7 pm
Admission: FREE!
Reception at 6:30 pm
WordSpace is honored to present an annual program of youth writers at the SMU Literary Festival.
Schools include Hockaday School, Booker T. Washington School for the Visual and Performing Arts, Yavneh Academy, Hockaday School, Trinity Valley School, Prometheus Academy and a presentation by Dallas Youth Poets students.
These Students bring the mentorship of some of the most talented writers working in education- including Dr. Tim Cloward, Scott Davison, Luke Jacob, Kyle Vaughn, Alexandra Marie Thurston, Joaquin Zihuatanejo, Isabella Russell-Ides and Karen X Minzer.
Nothing gets these students going more than their annual presentation at SMU Lit Fest, as they open the Festival with a reception and fill the auditorium with their fans. WordSpace has presented an annual student reading since 2002. Other venues have included the Kessler Theater and Lucky Dog Books. Many of these young writers have gone on to win major awards.
Join us for an evening of inspiring previews of literary artists and the first cornerstone of the WordSpace Next Generation Project.
Check out the many fine writers being presented at the 2014 SMU Literary Festival: For More Information about 2014 Southern Methodist University Lit Fest and presenters, click here:
Seamus Heaney Salon with David Holdeman
What: Seamus Heaney Salon, facilitated by Dr. David Holdeman
When: Thursday, April 10, 7 pm
Where: Private Residence, RSVP wordspace@wordspace
Please Note: This is a public event but requires RSVP for address
Admission: Suggested Donation at event, Members Free
Celebrate National Poetry Month!
Seamus Justin Heaney was an Irish poet, playwright, translator and lecturer, and the recipient of the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature.In the early 1960s, he became a lecturer in Belfast after attending university there, and began to publish poetry. He lived in Sandymount, Dublin, from 1972 until his death.
Heaney was a professor at Harvard from 1981 to 1997 and its Poet in Residence from 1988 to 2006. From 1989 to 1994 he was also the Professor of Poetry at Oxford and in 1996 was made a Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et Lettres. Other awards that he received include the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize (1968), the E. M. Forster Award (1975), the PEN Translation Prize (1985), the Golden Wreath of Poetry (2001), T. S. Eliot Prize (2006) and two Whitbread Prizes (1996 and 1999). In 2012, he was awarded the Lifetime Recognition Award from the Griffin Trust For Excellence In Poetry. His literary papers are held by the National Library of Ireland.
David Holdeman, professor of English at the University of North Texas, leads us through a reading of the poems of Seamus Heaney, the great Irish poet and winner of the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature. His death last year at the age of 74 brought mourning and joyous memories of the great poet, teacher and critic. William Logan has called Heaney’s “the most flexible and beautiful voice of our age.” Andrew Motion in The Guardian says one of Heaney’s great strengths is that “his high-mindedness never escapes the limits of the familiar experience – but at the same time he leaves us in no doubt that his first loyalty is to what Yeats called ‘the spiritual intellect’s great work.’”
Dr. Holdeman’s insightful explication and reading of Yeats’ poems here two springs ago was buoyant and moving, and he is also a lover of Heaney’s life-enhancing poems of Seamus Heaney. Holdeman’s scholarly books include The Cambridge Introduction to W. B. Yeats (Cambridge, 2006) and W. B. Yeats in Context (Cambridge, 2010).
Justen Ahren Salon
What: Salon with Justen Ahren
When: Thursday, February 20, 7 pm
Where: Private Residence, RSVP wordspace@wordspace.us
Please Note: This is a public event but requires an RSVP for address of the private residence
Admission: Suggested Donation at the event
West Tisbury, Massachusetts Poet Laureate Justen Ahren has published poems in numerous literary journals including, most recently, Fulcrum, BorderSenses, Borderlands, Texas Poetry Review, and Comstock Review. A graduate of Emerson College’s MFA program in creative writing, Mr. Ahren is founder and Director of Noepe Center for Literary Arts and the Martha’s Vineyard Writers Residency. He teaches poetry and writing workshops on Martha’s Vineyard and in Labro, Italy.
Swirve Presents Swirve and Matt Bagley
What: Swirve Presents Swirve
Special Guest: Matt Bagley
When: Saturday, December 14, 8 pm
Where: WordSpace, 415 North Tyler Street
Bonus: It’s Block Party Night on Tyler Street! Friendly folks, arts and culture and complimentary beverages with From the Ends of the Earth, Manuel Pecino Gallery, and Drive by Pickers
Swirve is a Dallas music, spoken word and experimental performance ensemble featuring Tamitha Curiel, Chris Curiel and Gerard Bendiks. The members have been known to play the trumpet backwards, the drums upside-down, and shout sideways. They have performed in galleries, nightclubs, festivals and bbqs. They have also collaborated with many of Dallas’s other fine artists, including Tammy Gomez, Mad Swirl. Alison Starr, Kenny Withrow, and members of Yells at Eels.
In conjunction with his “Artifacts of the Imagination” exhibition opening at Mighty Fine Arts, Matt Bagley joins spoken word/music group Swirve as a special guest to present his rock operetta on SpaceBugRobot Wars at WordSpace. Swamp Daddy Matt Bagley has returned from his interstellar teleportation travels back to the earthly realm with tales of remote universes and cosmic dramas. He brings back stories of his encounters with sentient robots and trained insects and exotic space critters that suffer ordeals not unlike those those in the bayou. The artifacts he returns with bear witness to the universality of being, life in space and earth, couched in metaphor and imagination.
Writing the Assassination with Hugh Aynesworth, Tim Cloward and Bryan Woolley
Panel and Book Signing: Writing the Assassination: Dallas Authors Respond to November 22, 1963
Who: Hugh Aynesworth, Bryan Woolley, Dr. Tim Cloward
Video Presentation: JFK Unspoken Speech Project
When: Sunday, November 17, 4-6
Where: Half Price Books, NW Highway
Tim Cloward facilitates a discussion among authors Hugh Aynesworth and Bryan Wooley who have recent books released on the assassination. A diverse range of topics will be addressed and books will be available for purchase.
Hugh Aynesworth is an American journalist, investigative reporter, author, and teacher. Aynesworth has been reported to have witnessed the assassination of John F. Kennedy in Dealey Plaza, the capture and arrest of Lee Harvey Oswald at the Texas Theater, and the shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby in the basement of the Dallas Police Headquarters. In a 1976 Texas Monthly article, William Broyles, Jr. described Aynesworth as “one of the most respected authorities on the assassination of John F. Kennedy”.
Through a myriad of characters both real and invented (and some whose names have been changed) journalist and author Bryan Woolley presents one of the best dissections of Dallas life in 1963 in his novel November 22. Covering the twenty-four hours surrounding the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Woolley accurately captures the essence of the day’s atmosphere, resulting in a rich cross section of a city more complex and diverse than many observers have been willing to acknowledge. He describes in microcosm how the world changed in the twinkling of an eye and peers into the shifting lives of all people affected by this shattering event. Readers will be surprised at how relevant the book is to the Dallas–and America–of right now.
Panel Facilitator: Tim Cloward, Ph.D., is the author of the upcoming book The City that Killed Kennedy: A Cultural History of Dallas and the Assassination (Winner of the 2013 Mayborn Conference Book Manuscript Award). His essay “Conspiracy-A-Go-Go,” an excerpted chapter of his book, will be published in the upcoming Fall issue of the Southwest Review.
David Haynes
Who: DAVID HAYNES
What: New Book! Meet the Author of “A Star in the Face of the Sky”
When: Thursday, January 30, 7:00
Where: Salon, Private Residence
RSVP: wordspace@wordspace.us or 214-838-3554
Admission: Members Free. NonMembers-donation suggested. Refreshments served.
A STAR IN THE FACE OF THE SKY examines the consequences of family tragedy. Left with the care of her only surviving grandchild, Janet Williams desires that his life not be contaminated by his mother’s insanity. When her imprisoned daughter reaches out to him, Janet scrambles to keep Daniel from her clutches. Janet’s best friend, Estelle, provides refuge for her own misunderstood grandson, Ari, all the while pursuing her father’s dying wish that his riches leave the world a better place. These four lives intersect—with each other, with the past, with the dead, with memory. The novel explores the legacy of history, the evils of spite and, ultimately, the power of love. A STAR IN THE FACE OF THE SKY (New Rivers Press, October 2013)-Click here for the website.
David Haynes earned a B.A. in literature from Macalester College, Minnesota, in 1977 and an M.A. from Hamline University, Minnesota, in 1989. A former fifth and sixth grade teacher, he served as a teacher in residence at the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. Haynes also served on the leadership team at the experimental Saturn School of Tomorrow. His book Right by My Side (New Rivers Press, 1993) was a winner in the 1992 Minnesota Voices Project and was selected by the American Library Association as one of 1994’s best books for young adults. Two of Haynes’s stories have been recorded for the National Public Radio series “Selected Shorts.” In 1996 Granta magazine named Haynes as one of the best young American novelists. Haynes is currently an associate professor and the director of creative writing at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. He teaches regularly in the Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers and has taught in the MFA programs at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, Hamline University, and at the Writer’s Center in Bethesda, MD, and at the Writers’ Garret in Dallas. His teaching interests include gender, class, race, and generational differences – all themes that he explores in great depth in A Star in the Face of the Sky.
