Free literary events at Eugene Public Library – JUNE 2013

Summer Reading for All Ages at Eugene Public Library
Starting June 1. Sign up and join in the fun at Eugene Public Library with this year’s Summer Reading theme, “Dig Into Reading.”  Visit any Library location — Downtown, Sheldon, or Bethel — to sign up and get a calendar of free events. Each child and teen gets a free book; each adult gets a free book bag and a coupon for a free coffee or $1 off books at the Friends of the Library book store. Plus, adults can enter a free raffle for Unique Eugene gift certificates by sharing their book reviews at the Library website. Information:541-682-5450 or www.eugene-or.gov/library<http://www.eugene-or.gov/library>.

Poetry Writing Workshop
Saturday, June 1, 2:00 – 5:00 p.m., Downtown Eugene Public Library, 10th & Olive
Adults are invited to a fun-filled poetry writing workshop led by local poets C. Steven Blue, Michele Graf, and Cameron Parker. Beginners welcome! Sponsored by Eugene Public Library, Lane Literary Guild, Willamette Writers, and Groundwaters. Free. Information: 541-682-5450 or www.eugene-or.gov/library<http://www.eugene-or.gov/library>.

Pamela Wible: Physician & Author
Thursday, June 6, 6:00 p.m., Downtown Eugene Public Library, 10th & Olive
Local physician Pamela Wible has become a national voice for revolutionizing the “business” of medicine. Join her for a talk based on her book, “Pet Goats & Pap Smears: 101 Medical Adventures to Open Your Heart & Mind.” A family physician born into a family of physicians, after a decade of practice Wible found the existing system to be a “medical mill.” She decided to hold open town hall meetings to invite community members to design the clinic of their dreams – and then opened one. Her pioneering model has sparked a populist movement inspiring the creation of “ideal” clinics and hospitals nationwide. Free. Information: 541-682-5450 or www.eugene-or.gov/library<http://www.eugene-or.gov/library>.

Poetry Showcase & Open Mic
Saturday, June 8, 2:00 – 5:00 p.m., Downtown Eugene Public Library, 10th & Olive
Keynote reader Ingrid Wendt, C.S. Blue, and other local poets will host a poetry showcase featuring a diverse variety of readings and performance, followed by an open mic reading. Everyone is welcome to read; sign up starting at 2:00. Sponsored by Eugene Public Library, Lane Literary Guild, Willamette Writers, and Groundwaters. Free. Information: 541-682-5450 or www.eugene-or.gov/library<http://www.eugene-or.gov/library>.

Sonny Montes & Mexican American Activism in Oregon
Sunday, June 9, 2:00 p.m., Downtown Eugene Public Library, 10th & Olive
Author Glenn Anthony May will share three interrelated stories:  the life of Sonny Montes, a migrant farm worker from South Texas who came to Oregon to pick crops; the emergence of a Mexican American community in Oregon in the 1960s, a story in which Montes played a major part; and the development of a Chicano movement in Oregon, led by Montes, in the 1970s.
A University of Oregon history professor, Dr. May wrote the Oregon Book Award finalist “Sonny Montes and Mexican American Activism in Oregon.” He has also written five books on Philippine history. Free. Information: 541-682-5450 or www.eugene-or.gov/library<http://www.eugene-or.gov/library>.

Originality Through Imitation: Writing Workshop with Melissa Hart
Thursday, June 13, 6:00 p.m.,  Downtown Eugene Public Library, 10th & Olive
Melissa Hart will teach a fun, high-energy workshop titled “Originality Through Imitation,” exploring ways writers can use reading to enhance their own work. The group will study two short pieces of prose and poetry to examine each writer’s style, syntax, and theme. Then, each participant will use the pieces as inspiration for an original poem and short essay suitable for revision and publication.

Hart’s essays and travel writings have been seen widely in a range of publications from The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, and The Boston Globe to The Chronicle of Higher Education, Horizon Air Magazine, and Writer’s Digest. The author of a memoir, “Gringa: A Contradictory Girlhood,” she also teaches writing at conferences and through the University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication. Free. Information: 541-682-5450 or www.eugene-or.gov/library<http://www.eugene-or.gov/library>.

How Writers Read: Writing Workshop with Elizabeth Lyon
Saturday, June 22, 3:00 p.m., Downtown Eugene Public Library, 10th & Olive
They say that one of the best things writers can do is read. According to writing teacher Elizabeth Lyon, “Quantity is no substitute for quality — and what we read is no substitute for how we read.” Learn how to cultivate the fine art of gleaning: extracting useful tips and techniques from authors you admire.

Lyon is a professional writer, editor, instructor, and the author of “Nonfiction Book Proposals Anybody Can Write,” “The Sell Your Novel Tool Kit,” “A Writer’s Guide to Nonfiction,” and “A Writer’s Guide to Fiction.” Her book “Manuscript Makeover” was named one of the “8 Great Writing Books of 2008″ by The Writer magazine. Free. Information: 541-682-5450 or www.eugene-or.gov/library<http://www.eugene-or.gov/library>.

Love to Read Book Club at the Library
Wednesday, June 26, 10:00 a.m., Downtown Eugene Public Library, 10th & Olive
Like to read? Like to visit? This may be the club for you! The Love to Read Book Club meets at Campbell Community Center on the 4th Wednesday of each month, but this month will celebrate Summer Reading with a special meeting at the Downtown Eugene Public Library. Everyone’s invited to join facilitator Willa Reich for a discussion of “Dreams of Joy” by Lisa See. Register for free class  #105262 by calling 541-682-5318.

The Owyhee River Journals
Saturday, June 29, 3:00 p.m., Downtown Eugene Public Library, 10th & Olive
Join Bonnie Olin for a richly-illustrated talk about her book “The Owyhee River Journals” created with photographer Mike Quigley, who has been exploring the Owyhee Canyonlands since 1975. Olin joined him in 1993 and began keeping a personal record of their travels together. Her journals, combined with his photographs of rarely seen landscapes, offer a vicarious journey into the canyonlands of the Owyhee River in Nevada, Idaho, and Oregon. Free. Information: 541-682-5450 or www.eugene-or.gov/library<http://www.eugene-or.gov/library>.

Spring Creek sponsored a fascinating symposium, ‘Words on Fire: Toward a New Language of Wildland Fire,’ earlier this month. Many of you might be interested in the videos, links below. Stephen Pyne’s keynote is especially provocative. More info and  the schedule are on our website.

This symposium considered the range of language we currently use to grapple with wildland fire, and look toward new metaphors and revitalized language that might help us forge ever more thoughtful, realistic, flexible, and creative relationships with wildland fire.

Best Thanksgiving wishes.

Charles Goodrich

Words on Fire: Toward a New Language of Wildland Fire–videos

1. Stephen J. Pyne Keynote: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_uo5e6hbq

2. Garrett Meigs slideshow: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_b4qorpdu

3. Dean Thomas Maness ‘Welcome’: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_wf2ko7dk

4. Charles Goodrich Intro: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_dm5xq9wd

5. Bill Anthony: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_fp9piq2x

6. Tim Ingalsbee: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_8guc8env

7. Karin Riley: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_t9msdwpo

8. Ingalsbee/Riley Q & A: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_zw812xve

9. Mary Beth Leigh: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_glm8y1cg

10. Sarah Trainor: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_r30dovna

11. Colleen Morton Busch: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_fof1he9z

12. Panel Discussion: http://media.oregonstate.edu/index.php/show/?id=0_0a0lrhrk

Exploring Sacred Space through words, we’ll use writing to identify architectural elements. We’ll write to remember and analyze the way flame, water, earth and air uplift the human spirit. We’ll consider which sounds, smells, lights, colors, tastes and touch expand the soul. Though this workshop focuses on places of corporate worship, it is applicable to all the spaces we wish to make sacred. Presenter: Nan Phifer is an associate director of the Oregon Writing Project at the University of Oregon, Eugene and author of Memoirs of the Soul: A Writing Guide.

Friday, November 12, 7- 9 p.m. and Saturday, November 13, 9:30 – 3:30.

For information and to register, see  http://www.benedictine-srs.org/shalomevents.html, or call Sister Dorothy Jean Beyer at 503 845-6773.

Save October 7^th and 8^th (Thursday and Friday) 2010 for the 3^nd Annual POETRY WORKSHOP IN DUFUR, OREGON – THE MUSIC OF SURPRISE: Writing for the Ear as well as the Eye – Work with sound and rhythm to make your poems fresh and unexpected. Start new poems and take old poems a step further. Give yourself two days to fine tune your poetry. Come stay at the charming Balch Hotel in Dufur, Oregon, and practice a better ear for your own writing. Learn to manipulate meter and see what happens as you experiment with the flexible music of our rich English language.

The Music of Surprise is a two-day workshop full of sound-oriented writing prompts and radical revision of new and old material. We will spend one night (Thursday, October 7, 2010) at the hotel with no television or phones to distract us. There we will work in the beautiful parlor and in our own private rooms. On Thursday we will have lunch and dinner at the hotel plus an after-dinner reading just among ourselves followed by a brief homework assignment. Our Friday session will include breakfast and lunch.

The workshop will be limited to nine participants so that everyone gets time and attention. Cost for the workshop itself is $125 plus hotel and meals (both reasonable).

If you are interested, request a registration form and send two recent poems. For more information, please e-mail, phone, or write to: Penelope Scambly Schott at 507 NW Skyline Crest Road, Portland, Oregon 97229 — Phone: 503-291-0159,  e-mail: penelopeschott@comcast.net. Why have a workshop in Dufur? Because it’s a quiet little town with a view of the east side of Mount Hood and a charming small hotel (www.balchhotel.com) where we won’t be thinking our ordinary thoughts. (In case you’re curious, the town is named after Andrew & Enoch Dufur who came in 1859.) Where is Dufur? From Portland, drive out through the Columbia Gorge and turn south.  Dufur is twenty minutes south of Route 84 on 197.  It’s a beautiful trip. From the east side of Portland 1 hour 45 minutes (100 miles), from The Dalles 20 minutes (15 miles),from Bend 2 hours 30 minutes (115 miles), from Pendleton 2 hours 20 minutes (140 miles), from Salem 2 hours 35 minutes (150 miles)

Deanna Ludwin, who met Lisa at Colorado State 25 years ago, has given a gift of $200 to sponsor workshop scholarships in her honor. The scholarships are available to women poets who want to attend one of the Guild’s one-day craft workshops. Lisa’s love of poetry lives on — thank you Deanna, for your generous gift! If you would like to apply for a workshop, please get in touch with Toni Van Deusen at tonipoet@gmail.com.

The Power and Play of Discovery

John Morrison

What is more seductive in a poem than discovery? Be it fresh, new language, an overwhelming image, or an inescapable momentum like the current of a fierce river, we might all die of boredom if poetry couldn’t strike new sparks and lead us to a new aural or interior landscape. So how do we invite discovery into our work?

Our session will be part workshop, discussion and exercise, where we will share our own poems and be open to opportunities for new possibilities and strategies. We will also ask about the bloodlines and life-blood of our poems, and move the pen across the paper in vibrant explorations. As time allows, we may share our own writing “practice,” the rituals we employ to move us from first notion through revision to the version we trust to the mail. We may also step into a few models from contemporary poetry.

Come ready to share and risk a bit, and we’ll make our way to new ground.

John Morrison earned his MFA from the University of Alabama and received the 2003 C. Hamilton Bailey Poetry Fellowship from Literary Arts. His book, Heaven of the Moment, won the 2006 Rhea & Seymour Gorsline Poetry Competition and was a finalist for the 2008 Oregon Book Award in poetry. His poems have appeared in numerous national literary journals, including the Cimarron Review, Poetry East, Southern Poetry Review, and Poet Lore. He has taught poetry at the University of Alabama and Washington State University, Vancouver, and is a Writer-in-Residence for Literary Arts’ Writers in the Schools program in Portland, Oregon.

MARCH 6, SATURDAY — LAMB COTTAGE IN SKINNER BUTTE PARK

Guild members, $50, non-members, $65. Scholarships available. For more info contact tonipoet@gmail.com.