Karen Russell reading this Thursday!

Please join us for our last reading of the semester: Karen Russell, author of St Lucy's Home For Girls Raised By Wolves, at 4:30, December 4th, in the Library Auditorium at TCNJ.

Writing Communities blogs: Can you keep up?

This semester several students are blogging independently about TCNJ's Writing Communities class and their own explorations in the literary world. In these blogs you'll find clips of poetry readings, hilarious observations, comments from poets on their own work, and more. Check it out.

Stolen Vermeer Reflections (Ashley Gallagher)
WC Reading Journal (Gabrielle Reed)
TCNJ Writing Communities (Josephine Cusumano)
Singerlit (Allison Singer)
Give Me Pinkstone And A Pen (Rachel Pinkstone)

Stay tuned as more blogs come online throughout the semester.

Dodge Poetry Festival: Don't Miss It!

"Historic Waterloo Village in Stanhope, New Jersey will be re-opened especially for the audiences of up to 20,000 expected for the 12th biennial Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival, which will run from Thursday, September 25 through Sunday, September 28, 2008.

Join poets Chris Abani, Coleman Barks, Coral Bracho, Billy Collins, Lucille Clifton, Mark Doty, Martín Espada, Joy Harjo, Robert Hass, Brenda Hillman, Edward Hirsch, Jane Hirshfield, Ted Kooser, Maxine Kumin, Naomi Shihab Nye, Sharon Olds, Linda Pastan, Charles Simic, C.D. Wright, Franz Wright and dozens of other accomplished poets, musicians and storytellers for four days of poetry and music beside the Musconetcong River and among Waterloo Village’s lawns, trees, and landmark historic buildings."

Princeton Reading Series this fall

Princeton has a terrific line-up of writers appearing this semester. For more information, and directions, go here.

	09/24	Breyten Breytenbach and Uzodinma Iweala
	10/15	Brigit Pegeen Kelly and Marie Howe
	10/22	Elizabeth Alexander and Terrance Hayes
	11/05	Nathan Englander and Jim Shepard
	11/19	Christian Barter, Tarell Alvin McCraney and Whitney Terrell
	12/03	Lydia Davis and Francine Prose (7:30 pm)

TCNJ Visiting Writers Series, Fall 2008

All events are held in the Library Auditorium, in the basement of TCNJ's beautiful new library, at 4:30 PM, with a reception and booksigning afterwards.

Tuesday, September 30th:
Tracy K. Smith, poet, author of Duende and The Body's Question

Thursday, October 23rd:
Joshua Beckman, poet, author of Shake and Your Time Has Come

Thursday, December 4th:
Karen Russell, author of St Lucy's Home For Girls Raised By Wolves

Welcome back!

Lit@TCNJ is back again for another school year. We have wonderful events on campus already planned and in the works, a new and energized Ink leadership, and many great events happening in the area. Stay tuned.

Shakespeare 70 Presents "The Constant Wife"

W. Somerset Maugham's "The Constant Wife" will be performed at TCNJ next week. Come out and support this unusual and fascinating production:

Performance dates: February 14, 15, 16, 21, 22 & 23 at 8 pm, February 24 at 2 pm

Don Evans Black Box Theater

for cast, ticket info, go to Shakespeare 70 website: http://www.shakespeare70.org/index.html

More events this spring

This spring is jam-packed with great events in our area. Get out your calendars and make your plans early!

2/9-2/15: Tibetan monks from Namgyal Monastery (the Dalai Lama's official monastery in North America) will build a sand mandala in the main floor of the TCNJ library. Viewing hours are from approximately 9:30-12 and 1:30-5.

3/25: Edwidge Danticat, novelist and memoirist, will deliver the Toni Morrison lecture at Princeton, 8 PM, Richardson Auditorium

3/26: Chinua Achebe, author of Things Fall Apart and many other books, in conversation with K. Anthony Appiah, 6 PM, Nassau Presbyterian Church (in Princeton)

4/3: Gerald Stern, one of America's most distinguished poets, Master Class in Poetry, Library Auditorium, TCNJ, at 4:30 PM

Princeton events this spring

Princeton's got a great schedule this season. Some highlights:

2/20: George Saunders and Natasha Trethewey

3/13: Amy Hempel and Jennifer Egan (both former TCNJ readers!)

03/26: Claire Messud and Edward Hirsch

04/09: Gary Shteyngart and Rick Moody

All on Wednesdays, 4:30 PM, in the James Stewart Theater at 185 Nassau Street (rear entrance).

On newsstands now!

The fall issue of the Siren, TCNJ's literary magazine, can be found in many strategic distribution points (i.e. large cardboard boxes) around campus today. It's a feast for the eyes and the mind.

It's almost like it never happens

"Underfunded Schools Forced To Cut Past Tense From Language Programs"
(Via The Onion)

John Ashbery at Princeton, 12/6

John Ashbery is reading next Thursday at 4:30, McCosh 60, Princeton University.

Here's a map that shows how to get there. As with any event at Princeton, the best place to park is in the Spring Street Garage, one block away from campus. (From TCNJ, follow 206 north to Princeton, turn right on Nassau Street, turn left on Witherspoon, then immediate right on Spring, and you're there).

Buy a Book from An Indie Bookstore This Season!

The holiday season is a crucial season for all retailers, and none more so than independent bookstores. Do them a favor and shop local for gifts this year.

The Raconteur (Metuchen)
Labyrinth Books (Princeton)
Classics Books, 117 S. Warren, Trenton
Glen Echo Books (Princeton)
Cranbury Book Worm (Cranbury)

Get Lit!

Literary Week begins tomorrow!

Monday Nov 26 - Student Reading Series, 8pm, Library Auditorium. Come see Nicole Gough, Joleen Ong, and David Koshar read their work!
Tuesday Nov 27 - The Poem You Wish You Had Written, 11:30, Bliss 129. Share the poem you love so much you wish you had penned it yourself!
Wednesday Nov 28 - field trip to Princeton to see Nick Flynn and Susanna Moore. We're leaving at 3:30, EMAIL ink@tcnj.edu TO RSVP if you need a ride!
Thursday Nov 29 - Visiting Writers Series Monique Truong, 4:30, Library Auditorium. Come see acclaimed professional author Truong read her work!
Friday Nov 30 - Siren Release Party, 11:30, location TBA. Celebrate the Siren's release with some of its contributors and goodies!
Saturday Dec 1 - THE GOODS, 1-7 pm, the Rat. Check out talented TCNJ students performing anything and everything theyve got, as long as its awesome.

Hope to see you at all of these fantastic events! Support ink and TCNJ's Literary Community - GET LIT!

Sherman Alexie at Rutgers, 11/28

Sherman Alexie, novelist and filmmaker, perhaps the most prominent Native American writer working today, is appearing at Rutgers November 28th at 7:30. Too many events, too little time...

In case you were wondering about the future...

Amazon has just introduced its new handheld book reader, Kindle. This is a wireless device that can pick up newspapers and magazines as well as hold e-books, all for a fee, of course. There are already 78 customer reviews, and so far it gets three stars. Will Amazon be undone by its own rating system? Will anyone want to risk their eyesight to carry around fifty books at once?

Monique Truong at TCNJ, 11/29

Ms. Truong, author of the bestselling novel The Book of Salt, is reading in the TCNJ Library Auditorium on Thursday, Nov. 29, at 4:30 p.m.

Come enjoy the afternoon with us! It's free and open to the public.

I am surrounded on all sides by strangers, strung along a continuously unraveling line that keeps them above the water's surface. It is a line that I cannot possibly hold onto. GertrudeStein knows it, and she has cast me in there anyway ...

A Vietnamese immigrant has been cooking for Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas in their quirky house in Paris. When the couple leaves for the U.S., the cook, not sure what to do with himself, starts to tell his fascinating, sometimes painful story.

The French language frustrates him on the streets of Paris, but his internal voice is beautiful, if not always reliable.

Directions to TCNJ
Campus map

The final installment of this year's Visiting Writers Series, sponsored by ink.

Mark your calendars: Ashbery at Princeton

John Ashbery is appearing in a special event at Princeton on Thursday, December 6th in the afternoon. Location details are not yet forthcoming...stay tuned!

Julia Slavin's story in Tin House

Those who enjoyed "Drive Through House," the story Julia Slavin read at TCNJ in September, can find it in the new issue of Tin House, "Fantastic Women." It's an extraordinary issue that profiles a new generation of (mostly) younger fabulist writers and their allies, including Judy Budnitz, Sarah Shun-lien Bynum, Miranda July, Shelley Jackson, Lydia Millet, Kelly Link, and Stacey Levine.

Nick Flynn and Susanna Moore at Princeton, 11/28

Nick Flynn, poet and memoirist, and Susanna Moore, novelist, are reading at Princeton on Wednesday November 28th at 4:30. Flynn is the author of Another Bullshit Night in Suck City, and I look forward to hearing whoever introduces him read that title out loud.