Stephen Burt

University of Chicago

admin — Sat, 16 Jan 2016 05:25:17 +0000

I’ll be at the University of Chicago for two events Tuesday Jan. 19 and Wednesday Jan. 20 2016: on Tuesday I’ll be reading poetry and talking about my (very nonscholarly) versions of Callimachus at 7pm, and on Wednesday I’ll be giving a critical talk in the History and Forms of Lyric series, at 4:30pm. The talk is called “How to Make an Anthology, or the Literary History of the Present.” If you live in Chicago perhaps I will see you there.

A video/ audio reading in Scotland (sort of) with David Wheatley

admin — Tue, 27 Oct 2015 15:49:26 +0000

A few weeks ago David Wheatley and I read together for the Scottish Poetry Library, in a delightful online-only real-time event orchestrated by Robert Peake and Jennifer Williams.

You can now see and/or hear the whole event, or any part thereof, via YouTube, by clicking the link in this sentence. Thanks, YouTube! Thanks, Jennifer and Robert and David and tech support people! Let us know what you think, if you do check it out!

All-Season Stephanie

admin — Tue, 02 Jun 2015 03:59:45 +0000

My new chapbook All-Season Stephanie is now out and ready for you to order from the good folks at Rain Taxi, who published it! As the title implies, they are poems that show you (or show me) what my life could have been like if I had grown up as, and been seen as, a girl. Eowyn Evans did the art (Rain Taxi’s Kelly Everding deserves many thanks for the design). You can read a representative poem from the chapbook, “Esprit Stephanie,” at The Awl.

See you at AWP 2015!

admin — Fri, 03 Apr 2015 19:02:25 +0000

I’ll be happy to return temporarily to Minnesota for the Associated Writing Programs Conference (AWP) in Minneapolis, April 8-11 2015. I’m doing a few things (besides seeing friends and going to poetry readings) while I’m there.

You can hear me on the offsite panel organized by the London Review of Books, at Ryan’s Pub, 1410 Nicollet, 3pm Thursday. I’ll be honored to join J. Robert Lennon, Leslie Jamison, Christian Lorentzen and Emily Cooke.

You can hear me read poems at the Minnesota Expat Reading sponsored by Rain Taxi at the Walker Art Center at 6:30pm (both events are free and do not require AWP badges).I’ll be reading from my brand-new chapbook, All-Season Stephanie, as well as from various full-length books of poems.

If you are coming to the convention itself (i.e. if you have a badge) please do come to our Friday morning panel (at 9am) on conflicts of interest in book reviewing, with Eric Lorberer of Rain Taxi, Karen Long of the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards (late of the Cleveland Plain Dealer), Rusty Morrison of Omnidawn Press, and the fiction writer Brian Evenson.

I’ll be signing All-Season Stephanie at the Rain Taxi booth in the exhibit hall Friday at 10:30am, after our panel concludes.

“My 1985” in the New Yorker

admin — Fri, 03 Apr 2015 18:44:31 +0000

I’ve got a poem called “My 1985” in the March 23, 2015 New Yorker. You can hear me read it aloud too. You can read about some of the things and characters named in that poem here, and here and here; you can also (though I’m not sure that I’d recommend it) hear the original artists’ version of a song that the poem names.

Terrance Hayes: “My daddies have voices”

admin — Fri, 03 Apr 2015 18:32:52 +0000

I wrote about the poet Terrance Hayes, and also about Yona Harvey, for the New York Times Magazine. I’m rather happy with how it came out.

New interview with Matthea Harvey, with mermaids

admin — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 05:29:19 +0000

Over at the Paris Review blog, I have the delightful privilege of carrying on an extended conversation with Matthea Harvey, whose new book would be rather amazing even if it didn’t also include visual art: I’m pretty sure it’s her best yet.

New reviewing: Morris Stegosaurus

admin — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 05:26:16 +0000

Newest of all, at Cold Front I explain why you should strongly consider reading the poetry of Morris Stegosaurus. It says things about identity and fandom, or randoms, that nobody else has quite figured out how to say.

New reviews and poetry criticism: Laura Kasischke redux

admin — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 05:19:07 +0000

Every few years Laura Kasischke publishes a new book of poetry and I try to explain why she’s so good, and also why that book is not just like her last book (because, so far, they never are). This year the book is The Infinitesimals and it speaks directly to why there is poetry instead of no poetry at all.

Here’s the author reading aloud on PBS.

New reviews, comics edition: Ms Marvel, X-Men podcast, comics throughout history

admin — Sun, 16 Nov 2014 05:14:37 +0000

I’ve been thinking about superhero comics, too, and writing about them: Willow Wilson and Adrian Alphona’s Ms. Marvel (Kamala Khan), for example.

I’ve also been listening to a podcast about them, and it’s so good that I wrote about that too: Rachel and Miles X-Plain the X-Men. (It is totally plausible to me, as a teacher, that if you want to learn how to explain something complicated or how to do a compelling, fun podcast you will love this podcast even if you don’t care about the X-Men. But I’m not really in a position to know.)

Oh, and I read artsy non-superhero comics too. I even tried to explain them this summer in Artforum (subscriber login may be required).