Prose at The Poetry Center

Novelists, short-story writers, essayists and memoirists, artists and theorists, historians, and storytellers: from James Baldwin in 1960 on the art of the novelist, to Joan Didion's first public reading; Kathy Acker reading from manuscript in 1977; Jackie Wang debuting Carceral Capitalism with story-writer Lily Huoang; Frank Wilderson previewing his memoir Afropessimism a year before publication; radical historian Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz with friends; Lakota Sun Dance Chief David Swallow Jr. with Hafez Modirzadeh; and World War II Conscientious Objectors at City Light Bookstore. (Programs (more)

Asya Abdrahman, Faith Adiele, Tonya M. Foster: March 8, 2017

The Poetry Center and the Museum of the African Diaspora co-present artist Asya Abdrahman and writers Faith Adiele and...

Date: 03/08/2017

Kathy Acker and Jim Gustafson: February 9, 1977

The Poetry Center presents Kathy Acker, accompanied in her presentation by Rae Armantrout and Kit Robinson, and Jim...

Date: 1977-02-09

Etel Adnan, a Memorial Tribute: May 14, 2022

The Poetry Center, in conjunction with the Tripwire Cross-Cultural Poetics Series, presents a Memorial Tribute to Etel...

Date: 2022-05-14

James Baldwin: October 22, 1960

The Poetry Center presents James Baldwin, speaking and in discussion with Philip Roth and John Cheever, the final event...

Date: 10/22/1960

Caren Beilin and Amy Berkowitz: October 17, 2019

The Poetry Center presents Amy Berkowitz and Caren Beilin, reading and in conversation. Berkowitz reads from her...

Date: 2019-10-17

Amy Berkowitz and Caren Beilin: October 18, 2019

The Poetry Center presents Amy Berkowitz and Caren Beilin, reading at E.M. Wolfman Bookstore in Oakland, CA. Jacob Kahn...

Date: 2019-10-18

Lucia Berlin and Douglas Woolf: February 24, 1984

The Poetry Center presents Lucia Berlin and Douglas Woolf, each reading from their work, with introductions by...

Date: 1984-02-24

Lucia Berlin's A Manual For Cleaning Women: Selected Stories, a reading: October 7, 2015

The Poetry Center and the UC Berkeley Department of English co-present this celebration of the publication of Lucia...

Date: 10/07/2015

The Black Aesthetic: April 26, 2018

The Poetry Center presents The Black Aesthetic, including curatorial members Jamal Batts, Ryanaustin Dennis, and Leila...

Date: 04/26/2018

Bill Brown and James Koller: October 18, 1967

The Poetry Center presents Bill Brown reading from his novel, The Way to the Uncle Sam Hotel and James Koller reading...

Date: 10/18/1967

John Giorno and William S. Burroughs: November 4, 1974

The Poetry Center, in collaboration with Gay Sunshine , co-presents John Giorno and William S. Burroughs, each reading...

Date: 1974-11-04

Manolo Callahan, Stefano Harney, Tonika Sealy Thompson: December 4, 2016

The Poetry Center and the SFSU Labor Archives and Research Center co-present "Working with Others: Convivial...

Date: 12/04/2016

May-lee Chai and Junse Kim: November 8, 2018

The Poetry Center presents May-lee Chai and Junse Kim, reading and in conversation. May-lee Chai reads excerpts from her...

Date: 11/08/2018

Dennis Cooper and Eileen Myles: October 15, 2017

The Poetry Center presents Dennis Cooper and Eileen Myles reading at McRoskey Mattress Co., San Francisco. Dennis Cooper...

Date: 10/15/2017

Lucy Corin and Lance Olsen: September 25, 2014

The Poetry Center presents a reading and conversation from Lucy Corin and Lance Olsen, for a Prose at the Poetry Center...

Date: 2014-09-25

Jaime Cortez and Camille Roy: October 22, 2021

The Poetry Center, together with The Green Arcade, presents Camille Roy, reading from Honey Mine: Collected Stories...

Date: 2021-10-22

Robert Creeley: March 16, 1966

The Poetry Center presents Robert Creeley reading poems from his book Words, as well as a long prose piece titled The...

Date: 03/16/1966

Matthew Clark Davison, Stacy D. Flood, and Patrick Earl Ryan: February 24, 2022

For this Prose at The Poetry Center event, three friends and SF State alums: Matthew Clark Davison, Stacy D. Flood,...

Date: 2022-02-24

Juliana Delgado Lopera and Monique Jenkinson, aka Fauxnique: April 27, 2019

The Poetry Center presents "an afternoon of literary drag," with Spring 2019 Mazza Writer in Residence Juliana...

Date: 04/27/2019

Juliana Delgado Lopera and Joseph Cassara: May 2, 2019

The Poetry Center presents Spring 2019 Mazza Writer in Residence Juliana Delgado Lopera and Joseph Cassara, reading and...

Date: 05/02/19

Carolina De Robertis and Micah Perks: November 3, 2016

The Poetry Center presents Carolina De Robertis and Micah Perks reading and in conversation. Carolina De Robertis reads...

Date: 11/03/2016

Joan Didion: February 23, 1977

The Poetry Center presents Joan Didion, in what was her first ever public reading. Celebrated prose-stylist, journalist,...

Date: 1977-02-23

Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, Amy Sonnie, James Tracy and friends: September 10, 2021

The Poetry Center presents three outstanding Bay Area writer-activists, reading and in conversation on the radical...

Date: 2021-09-10

Ernest J. Gaines: March 6, 1974

The Poetry Center presents novelist Ernest J. Gaines, reading from an early typescript of his subsequent novel In My...

Date: 1974-03-06

Robert Glück: April 3, 1975

The Poetry Center presents Robert Glück, reading from his poems and other early work, including passages related to...

Date: 1975-04-03

Ariel Goldberg and Simone White: April 13, 2017

The Poetry Center presents Ariel Goldberg and Simone White reading and in conversation in celebration of the 50th...

Date: 04/13/2017

Judy Grahn: February 20, 2014

The Poetry Center presents Judy Grahn, reading from her memoir,  A Simple Revolution  (Aunt Lute Books, 2012)...

Date: 2014-02-20

Stefano Harney and Fred Moten: April 6, 2022

After an introduction by their friend and comrade Manolo Callahan, of the Center for Convivial Research and Autonomy ,...

Date: 2022-04-06

Anselm Hollo and Robert Harris: February 16, 1977

The Poetry Center presents Anselm Hollo and Robert Harris, reading from their work at San Francisco State University....

Date: 1977-02-16

John Hawkes, Herbert Kubly, Wright Morris: March 12, 1965

The Poetry Center, in association with the Contemporary Arts Festival, presents novelists John Hawkes, Herbert Kubly, and...

Date: 03/12/1965

Tim Z. Hernandez, with Marguerite Muñoz and René Juarez-Vazquez: May 9, 2019

The Poetry Center presents Tim Z. Hernandez, reading and in conversation with Marguerite Muñoz and René...

Date: 05/09/2019

Jackie Wang and Lily Hoang: March 1, 2018

The Poetry Center presents Jackie Wang and Lily Hoang, reading and in conversation. This event is one of many programs...

Date: 03/01/2018

Maia Ipp and Michael David Lukas: April 2, 2024

The Poetry Center presents a reading by Maia Ipp and Michael David Lukas at Medicine for Nightmares. Maia Ipp reads an...

Date: 2024-04-02

Darius James and Val Jeanty: April 18, 2019

The Poetry Center presents Darius James and Val Jeanty in a first-ever collaboratiive "workshop performance" at...

Date: 04/18/19

Darius James and Val Jeanty: April 19, 2019

The Poetry Center presents novelist-writer Darius James, and Val Jeanty, Haitian electronica composer-percussionist, in...

Date: 04/19/2019

Darius James: April 21, 2019

The Poetry Center and City Lights Books co-present Darius James, reading and in conversation. James reads excerpts from...

Date: 04/21/2019

LeRoi Jones, A Jazz Symposium on Blues People: March 4, 1965

The Poetry Center presents a Jazz Symposium on Blues People, featuring LeRoi Jones (a.k.a. Amiri Baraka), Philip Elwood,...

Date: 03/04/1965

John Keene: October 29, 2015

The Poetry Center presents John Keene reading his story "Cold" from his book Counternarratives (New Directions,...

Date: 10/29/2015

John Keene with Tân Khánh Cao: October 30, 2015

The Poetry Center presents John Keene reading his story "Acrobatique" from his book Counternarratives (New...

Date: 10/30/2015

R.O. Kwon and Nona Caspers: March 20, 2019

The Poetry Center presents R.O Kwon and Nona Caspers, reading and in conversation. Nona Caspers introduces then reads...

Date: 03/20/2019

Janice Lee with Brenda Iijima: November 29, 2018

The Poetry Center presents, as the inaugural program in its In Common Writers Series, Janice Lee, reading and in...

Date: 11/29/2018

Brenda Iijima and Janice Lee: December 1, 2018

The Poetry Center presents Brenda Iijima and Janice Lee, reading from new works. Brenda Iijima reads from unpublished...

Date: 12/01/2018

Legacy of Forugh Farrokhzad, with Sholeh Wolpé, Jasmin Darznik, and Shabnam Piryaei: December 3, 2020

The Poetry Center and the  Center for Iranian Diaspora Studies , San Francisco State University, co-present...

Date: 2020-12-03

Lauren Levin and Melissa Mack: February 21, 2019

The Poetry Center presents Lauren Levin and Melissa Mack, reading and in conversation. Melissa Mack, judge for the Poetry...

Date: 02/21/2019

LaTasha N. Nevada Diggs and Rachel Levitsky: October 3, 2013

The Poetry Center presents LaTasha N. Nevada Diggs and Rachel Levitsky, reading their work and engaging with...

Date: 2013-10-03

Elaine Kahn and Trisha Low: March 17, 2016

The Poetry Center presents Trisha Low performing pieces from The Compleat Purge (Kenning Editions, 2013) and Elaine Kahn...

Date: 03/17/2016

Syd Staiti and Trisha Low: September 26, 2019

The Poetry Center presents Syd Staiti and Trisha Low, reading and in conversation. Staiti reads a selection of their...

Date: 2019-09-26

 John Marron, Harry Mathews, Andrei Codrescu: April 24, 1975

The Poetry Center presents John Marron, Harry Mathews, and Andrei Codrescu, presenting their works at San Francisco...

Date: 1975-04-24

Donal McLaughlin: November 20, 2014

The Poetry Center presents a reading by Donal McLaughlin, in a Prose at The Poetry Center event, introduced by Peter...

Date: 2014-11-20

Okey Ndibe: February 12, 2015

The Poetry Center presents Nigerian novelist Okey Ndibe reading from and discussing his novel, Foreign Gods, Inc. (Soho...

Date: 02/12/2015

ZZ Packer and Angela Pneuman: April 10, 2014

The Poetry Center presents ZZ Packer and Angela Pneuman for a Prose at The Poetry Center event. Packer, at the time on...

Date: 2014-04-10

Grace Paley and Tillie Olsen: March 9, 1977

The Poetry Center presents Grace Paley and Tillie Olsen, each reading from their fiction. Paley, for her first ever...

Date: 1977-03-09

Brontez Purnell and Tommy Pico: September 13, 2018

The Poetry Center presents Brontez Purnell and Tommy Pico, reading and in conversation. Brontez Purnell reads from Johnny...

Date: 09/13/2018

Ishmael Reed and Stan Rice: October 4, 1973

The Poetry Center presents Ishmael Reed and Stan Rice, reading from their contemporary works, in this early black &...

Date: 1973-10-04

Cristina Rivera Garza and Kit Schluter: March 4, 2021

The Poetry Center presents Cristina Rivera Garza and Kit Schluter, reading and in conversation. Schluter reads three...

Date: 2021-03-04

Richard Brautigan and Floyd Salas: February 28, 1968

The Poetry Center presents Richard Brautigan and Floyd Salas, reading from their own works.

Date: 02/28/1968

Sarah Schulman and Terry Castle: April 7, 2016

The Poetry Center, in collaboration with Radar Productions and the SFSU Department of Women and Gender Studies, presents...

Date: 04/07/2016

Brandon Shimoda and Aisuke Kondo: March 7, 2019

The Poetry Center presents Brandon Shimoda and Aisuke Kondo, featuring a reading, an art presentation, and conversation....

Date: 03/07/2019

David Swallow Jr., Lakota Sun Dance Chief: February 4, 2022

The Poetry Center presents David Swallow Jr., Lakota spiritual teacher and veteran AIM (American Indian Movement)...

Date: 2022-02-04

Alice Walker on Zora Neale Hurston: October 2, 1980

The Poetry Center presents Alice Walker, talking about the life and work of Zora Neale Hurston and reading from...

Date: 1980-10-02

Lily Hoang and Jackie Wang: March 3, 2018

The Poetry Center presents Jackie Wang and Lily Hoang reading at The Green Arcade. This event, debuting Jackie...

Date: 03/03/2018

Frank B. Wilderson III: February 14, 2019

The Poetry Center presents Frank B. Wilderson III reading from the manuscript to his forthcoming book, provisionally...

Date: 02/14/2019

Angel Dominguez and Ronaldo V. Wilson: October 16, 2021

The Poetry Center presents Angel Dominguez and Ronaldo V. Wilson, in conversation with one another then followed by each...

Date: 2021-10-16

Monique Wittig and Jayne Cortez: April 12, 1985

The Poetry Center presents Monique Wittig and Jayne Cortez, reading their work on the opening night of the three-day...

Date: 1985-04-12

World War II Conscientious Objectors, Their Legacy of Art and Peace: October 15, 2014

The Poetry Center and City Lights Books co-present an evening devoted to the history presented in Steve...

Date: 2014-10-15