UCTV Podcasts Presents: Poetry, Authors and Books

Bonnie Wade is an ethnomusicology and Asian music specialist. In this presentation of Berkeley Writers at Work she reads from her writings and is then interviewed by Melinda Erickson of the College Writing Programs.

Jessica Fisher’s Frail-Craft was the winner of the prestigious 2006 Yale Series of Younger Poets competition. She is a doctoral candidate in English at U.C. Berkeley and is coeditor, with Robert Hass, of The Addison Street Anthology, which chronicles Berkeley’s rich poetic history.

Born in Mexico City, Monica de la Torre came to the United States in 1993 on a Fulbright scholarship to study at Columbia University. Her poetry explores with great depth both the boundaries and the permeability of imposed identity, combining a playful use of form and dry humor with a hint of hopefulness.

World-renowned poet Diane di Prima, one of the preeminent writers to emerge from the Beat generation, wrote in Manhattan for many years before relocating to San Francisco, where she has been for nearly four decades. Her 43 books of poetry and prose have been translated into over twenty languages.

Arthur Sze is an internationally known writer and celebrated translator. A recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and two grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Sze teaches at the Institute of American Indian Arts, and is the first poet laureate of Santa Fe, where he resides.

Rich in its landscapes and its search for personal discovery, John Matthias’ poetry encompasses vast territories of history and culture. He has published more than twenty-five books, twelve of which are poetry, and is the editor of Notre Dame Review. This is his first visit to the west coast in over twenty-five years.

Shoah or Ha Shoah is the Hebrew term for the Holocaust. Yale professor Geoffrey Hartman explores the universal aspect of Shoah literature. This is is the Inaugural Lecture of the George J. Wittenstein lecture series which commemorates the civic courage of Dr. George J. Wittenstein, member of two resistance groups against Hitler's dictatorship.

Professor James Young, Commissioner of Germany’s National Memorial to Europe’s Murdered Jews, and juror for the WTC Site Memorial Competition, discusses the history of memorial projects.

UCSD Professor of Modern Jewish Studies Deborah Hertz discusses her new book, which traces the social history of German Jewish families from 1645 through the 1930s.

Andrew Feenberg discusses his new collection of essays by Herbert Marcuse. The most influential radical philosopher of the 1960s, Marcuse's writings are noteworthy for their uncompromising opposition to both capitalism and communism.

Award-winning writer Maxine Hong Kingston is known for her works reflecting on Chinese-American culture and heritage. She is the author most recently of The Fifth Book of Peace, and won the National Book Award for her 1980 novel China Men. In 1997, she received the National Humanities Medal from President Bill Clinton. A native of California, Kingston is now a professor emerita at UC Berkeley.

>Lunch Poems Reading Series Iraqi poet Dunya Mikhail immigrated to the United States in 1996 after increasing harassment over her poetry, which confronts war and exile with subversive depictions of suffering. In 2001 she was awarded the UN Human Rights Award for Freedom of Writing.

A prominent figure in California’s poetry scene for decades, Joanne Kyger writes poetry influenced by her practice of Zen Buddhism and her ties to the poets of Black Mountain, the San Francisco Renaissance, and the Beat Generation.

"A German Childhood -- An American Life" is the topic of this talk by the wife of former New Jersey Senator Bill Bradley. Ernestine Bradley recounts her years in Nazi Germany and reads from her memoir, The Way Home, and takes audience questions in this event sponsored by the Osher Institute for Lifelong Learning at UC San Diego.

"A German Childhood -- An American Life" is the topic of this talk by the wife of former New Jersey Senator Bill Bradley. Ernestine Bradley recounts her years in Nazi Germany and reads from her memoir, The Way Home, in this event sponsored by the Osher Institute for Lifelong Learning at UC San Diego.

Will Alexander has created a contemporary alchemy of surrealist vision in his own electric incandescent language. Coined the Césaire of America, his poetry is full of imagistic and intelligent unraveling.

Author, poet, pastor and professor Eugene Peterson charms his audience as he recalls his effort to translate the Bible into The Message, an interpretation geared for modern readers. The book has such wide appeal that U2’s Bono began quoting from it at concerts. But when told of this, Peterson’s response was “Who is Bono?” Peterson is joined host Dean Nelson in Part 2 of the 2007 Writers Symposium by the Sea, sponsored by Point Loma Nazarene University.

Best-selling author Anne Lamott returns to San Diego with more hilarious tales of her life as a mother, daughter and writer who is drawn to the struggles of imperfect characters. The humor of host Dean Nelson puts the normally reclusive Lamott at ease and the two keep the audience laughing throughout this edition of the 2007 Writer’s Symposium by the Sea, sponsored by Point Loma Nazarene University.

After hosting Lunch Poems for eight years, Robert Hass has finally been prevailed upon to read his own poems in the series. Former Poet Laureate of the U.S., Hass is a UC Berkeley professor who has made important contributions in poetry, criticism, and translation. His books of poetry are Sun Under Wood, Human Wishes, Praise, and Field Guide, the latter winner of the Yale Younger Poets Award. His critical essays are assembled in Twentieth Century Pleasures, and the poets he has translated include Czeslaw Milosz, Tomas Tranströmer, and masters of Japanese haiku. [Humanities]

Author of the moving The Secret Life of Bees, which spent more than 75 weeks on The New York Times Bestseller List, Sue Monk Kidd reads from her work, including her new novel, The Mermaid's Chair. Kidd is acclaimed for her ability to weave together vividly drawn Southern locations and emotional tales of spirituality and feminism. [Humanities]

Juan Felipe Herrera traveled as a child with his parents through many small farming towns and cities in California, until finally settling in San Diego. He has taught poetry from kindergarten to the university level and is the author of numerous poetry and children's books, including Calling The Doves, which won the Ezra Jack Keats Award, and Crashboomlove, which was prized with the Americas Award. He also wrote Upside Down Boy, which was adapted into a musical in New York City, and Laughing Out Loud, I Fly, winner of a Pura Belpré honor award. He holds the Tomás Rivera Endowed Chair in Creative Writing at the University of California, Riverside. [Humanities] [Arts and Music]

California Poet Laureate Al Young has created a profound and enduring body of work that represents our time. Young's numerous publications in poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and for the stage and screen explore the American, human condition through the lens of the individual voice. Tune in as he reads a selection of his poems before a live audience at UC Berkeley. [Humanities]

A prominent figure in the wide-open poetry movement of the 50s, Lawrence Ferlinghetti gave voice to a generation that changed the face of poetry forever. Challenging the elite's definition of art and the artist's role, Ferlinghetti founded City Lights Bookstore, providing a meeting place for writers, artists, and intellectuals for over a half century. Ferlinghetti's A Coney Island of the Mind continues to be the most popular poetry book in the United States. His most recent work, Americus Book I was published by New Directions in 2004. Tune in for this reading before a live audience at UC Berkeley. [Humanities]

Pulitzer-prize winning historian Doris Kearns Goodwin shares riveting details from her latest work, "Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln" in this installment of the Great American Writers Series, sponsored by the San Diego Public Library and the City Club of San Diego. [Public Affairs]

Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer of Martin Luther King, Jr.,Taylor Branch explores America in the King years, 1965-68. Presented by the Walter H. Capps Center at UCSB. [Public Affairs] [Humanities]

U.S. Poet Laureate Ted Kooser is a major poetic voice for rural and small town America and the award-winning author of ten collections of poetry, most recently 2004's Pulitzer Prize-winning Delights and Shadows. Nebraskan Kooser often draws from his native Great Plains and his poems are acclaimed for their simple, straightforward style. Kooser reads from his poetry before a standing-room only audience in Campbell Hall at UC Santa Barbara. [Humanities] [Arts and Music]

After hosting Lunch Poems for eight years, Robert Hass has finally been prevailed upon to read his own poems in the series. Former Poet Laureate of the U.S., Hass is a UC Berkeley professor who has made important contributions in poetry, criticism, and translation. His books of poetry are Sun Under Wood, Human Wishes, Praise, and Field Guide, the latter winner of the Yale Younger Poets Award. His critical essays are assembled in Twentieth Century Pleasures, and the poets he has translated include Czeslaw Milosz, Tomas Tranströmer, and masters of Japanese haiku. [Humanities]