Alan and the Vision Series

"A Glimpse Into the Writer's Workshop"
Monday April 20, 2009
7pm, Concert Hall

Volunteer for Fall for the Book

MFA students! Fall for the Book, GMU's annual celebration of the literary arts held this year September 21–26, needs your help. Wade Fletcher, recent poetry MFA alum and Assistant Manager/Volunteer Coordinator for the festival, needs tons of volunteers to help before and during that week. Volunteers help drive authors, welcome attendees, oversee individual events, and assist with various other logistical tasks. The festival is especially in need of drivers to take authors to and from the airport, hotel, and events. This is a good way to meet individual authors and have an opportunity to chat with them. Wade said he’s happy to try to oblige requests to drive specific authors (or staff specific events). If you're interested, email him (fftbvols [at] gmu.edu), and he'll send a list of current needs. You can volunteer for as little or as much as you'd like. A list of needs follows. (This notice will be updated as needs change; it's linked to the right under “Volunteer for FFTB 2008.”)


Info Tent: 

Sept. 22–Sept. 26, mid-morning to late afternoon
Got time between classes? 30 minutes? 2 hours? This is the job for you: volunteers at the info tent answer questions, direct confused students, and promote events throughout the day. The tent will be centrally located outside the Johnson Center (if it rains, it will be inside).

Venue Managers: 

Sept. 22–Sept. 26
Each event needs a representative to greet the author and be there as the audience arrives. Venue Managers will be in the room before and after each event to answer the author and audience’s questions.

Drivers: 

Sept. 22–Sept. 26
Many authors are coming from out of town. They need to be met at airports and train stations, driven to the festival hotel, picked up at the hotel, and brought to events. This is a crucial role. If you're interested in meeting a writer and driving him or her to one place or another, please email Wade ASAP. Include information, if you would, please, about dates and times you are available.

"I Want to Help but I Don't Know What to Do": 

NOW until Sept. 26th
If you just want to meet and greet people, or are willing to help out with anything and everything, email Wade with your availability and he'll let you know what is open.

Further questions? Email Wade at fftbvols [at] gmu.edu.

American Classics: Page to Screen

This looks good—the Smithsonian American Art Museum, a nice building to look at any day, is showing a number of (mostly) classic movies that were adapted from books, including A Streetcar Named Desire, this Wednesday September 3 at 6; One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Wed. September 17; and Breakfast at Tiffanys, Wed. October 29.

Cheryl's Gone in June

If you get a chance, come to the June Cheryl's Gone Reading Series next week.

I'll be reading along with Mel Nichols and DJ Renegade.

With music by DJ Panic!

Event starts at 8pm on June 19th (Thursday).

Check out the website for bios of the readers as well as directions to Big Bear Cafe.

Literature Live: 3-Day Book Festival

Two of our own writers, faculty member Helon Habila and third year fiction writer Rion Scott, will be a part of this weekend's Literature Live, a 3 day book festival sponsored by UDC and the Hurston-Wright Foundation. He'll be sitting on a panel called The Young Lions: The New Black Male Writers. Below is a description of the event.

Saturday, March 29th
Busboys and Poets
2021 - 14th Street NW
11:45am to 1:15pm
The Young Lions: The New Black Male Writers

A reading and discussion. Panelists: Helon Habila, author of “Waiting for an Angel” and Creative Writing Professor at George Mason University, James Ocita, pursuing MFA at the University of Maryland, Rion Amilcar Scott, pursuing MFA at George Mason University, and William Henry Lewis, author of “In The Arms of Our Elders” and “I Got Somebody In Staunton.”
Moderated by Patricia Elam

Rion has this to say: "I'd love if you guys could make it out to see me in action. It's a reading and discussion so I'll also be sharing some of my more crackpot opinions on literature and life. It should be a good reading. I can vouch for William Henry Lewis, who will be reading along with me. He's the author of the amazing collection "I Got Somebody in Staunton." (The first story "Shades" is a showstopper.) I've seen him read on more than one occasion and I was blown away, even while hearing the same story twice."

For more info about the festival, check out this pdf.

Virginia Arts and Letters LIVE, featuring...

...work by fiction alum Ryan Effgen.

Here's the basic info:

On Saturday, March 29th, The James River Writers and Barksdale Theatre will present a series of short stories by Virginia writers. The stories will be performed by Virginia Actors to music performed by Virginia Musicians. It's all very Virginian, obviously, which is good.

Anyhow, Ryan's story, "The Pirate's Life for Me," which was published recently by Painted Bride Quarterly in one of their many Pirate-themed issues, is in the line-up.

The program begins at 8pm.

For more information, go to the site at James River Writers.

Reading Tonight with Liam Callanan

Tonight at 7:30 in Research I, room 163 fiction alum Liam Callanan will read from his work as part of the Visiting Writers series.

At 6:30 before the reading there will be a "mixer" for everyone attending.

Here's some basic info about Liam -

His website.

An interview by fiction alumna Colleen Kearney Rich posted over at The Mason Gazette.

And for those of you who haven't read anything of his, here's something from the '03 archives at failbetter.com. A story called "Taken."

Phoebe and So To Speak Party

This coming Monday, March 3rd, Phoebe and So To Speak will have a joint party and reading to celebrate the leap year. We are also, coincidentally, celebrating the launch of our latest issues. This all will occur at the Arlington Busboy's and Poets. Everyone is invited. Please bring other people. And tell other people about this. And bring things to read if you want, aloud.

The party will begin at 8pm, so you have time to eat dinner before you arrive.

We'll have a mix of editors and contributors reading from the issues, as well as an open mic somewhere in there.

Okay, here are the facts:

Monday, March 3, 2008
8:00 P.M.
@Busboys and Poets
Arlington Location
4251 South Campbell Ave.

In Shirlington Village

Easily accessible by car - just follow the 395 exit marked "Shirlington" and follow the sign to "The Village at Shirlington"- located across the street from Harris Teeter, The Arlington Public Library, and the new Signature Theater.

Candid Yak Schedule for this Spring

From the caretakers of the yak:

CANDID YAK – Spring 2008

February 22, 2008--------------GMU Campus: Johnson Center 3rd Floor Mtg. Room E

POETRY: Corey Spaley
FICTION: Rebecca McGill
NON-FICTION: Mike Scalise

March 7, 2008-----------------Firehouse Grille (3988 University Dr., Old Town Fairfax)

POETRY: Dan Ford
FICTION: Elizabeth MacBride
NON-FICTION: Misty Thomas

March 21, 2008-----------------GMU campus: Johnson Center 3rd Floor Mtg. Room E

POETRY: Angie Mazakis
FICTION: Kirsten Clodfelter
NON-FICTION: Kristin Hahn

April 4, 2008--------------------Firehouse Grille (3988 University Dr., Old Town Fairfax)

POETRY: Joe Hall
FICTION: David Rider
FICTION: Becky Bikowski

April 18, 2008------------------The Prose House (4131 Leonard Dr. Fairfax, VA)

POETRY: Ed Davis
FICTION: Jennifer Goldsmith
FICTION: Allyson Armstead

May 2, 2008-------------------Firehouse Grille (3988 University Dr., Old Town Fairfax)

POETRY: Caren Scott
FICTION: Kristin Von Kundra
NON-FICTION: Abby Martin

OPEN MIC Featuring 1st Year MFA Students: Sandy Marchetti starts it up

Candid Yak 2/8 at 8pm

You've probably seen the fliers that Wade made, you know the shark-televisions eating each other, so this is a quick reminder.

Candid Yak Friday (2/8) at the Firehouse Grill in Old Town Fairfax. Looks like things will get started around 8pm.

Readers for the evening are poet Rachel Lyon, non-fiction writer Casey Wiley, and fiction writer Regan Douglass. I hear that Ed will also be there doing things, like introducing people, which should be a pleasure. If you cannot go, kick yourself - he has a fine looking mustache these days.

Graphic Novels and PEN/Faulkner

From Elizabeth:

Thursday, November 8th at 7:00pm, Busboys and Poets is hosting a dinner and discussion about graphic novels. The next day there is a reading at Folger Library with Lynda Barry, Alison Bechdel, and Chris Ware, and that program is NOT sold out if anyone is interested. Also PEN/Faulkner says the more the better at the dinner, so drop by if you can. The dinner costs $15.00 for students (reduced from $22.50).

Free Mary Lee Settle Program

On Friday, November 2, at 7 PM, the PEN/Faulkner Foundation will hold a free reading honoring PEN/Faulkner founder Mary Lee Settle.

Reminder about The Fires

We've just mentioned Alan Cheuse's new book, The Fires, which The Santa Fe Writers Project will officially release on September 1st, but I want to talk about it again because Alan has been out west on a book tour for a while (I think), and he returns home this coming week to read at Politics&Prose on the 8th of September at 7pm (then he's back on the road).

In a way, this is how we show that we miss him.

For the Mason writers out there, I believe there's a party after the reading...if anyone has the details in an email, let me know.

Some links for you:

• Alan's page dedicated to the new book



• The Politics&Prose event calender



• To order the book, you can go here

Welcome Parties

Faculty poets Jennifer Atkinson and Eric Pankey will again host the Welcome Back MFA party at their house from 6:30 until 10:00 pm on Friday the 24th. They've got food, but if you've got something you absolutely need to drink, bring that along (at least that's what they say in the invite).

Later in the evening, the party will move to the Friendship House (where Danika, Corey, Rachael, Moriah, and Ethan live) for more things to do "before the semester starts and things get dumb."

Check your email for directions, phone numbers, and other specifics; if you haven't deleted anything, the invites are probably somewhere in your inbox. Otherwise, ask around. People will know.