Tonight, celebrated author Eileen Myles presents their new edited anthology PATHETIC LITERATURE. This utterly unique collection is composed of pieces from lesser-known classics by luminaries like Franz Kafka, Samuel R. Delany, and Gwendolyn Brooks to up-and-coming writers that examine pathos and feeling, giving a well-timed rehab to the word “pathetic." Contributors Rae Armantrout, Rebecca Brown, and Matthew Stadler will join for what promises to be a lively reading.Eileen Myles (they/them, b. 1949) is a poet, novelist and art journalist whose vernacular practice of mostly first-person writing has become a touchstone for the identity-fluid internet age. They are the living editor of Pathetic Literature. They live in New York City and Marfa, TX.
Writing for the Poetry Foundation, David Woo says that Rae Armantrout’s recent book Finalists (Wesleyan 2022) “emanates the radiant astonishment of living thought.” Her 2018 book, Wobble, was a finalist for the National Book Award that year. Her other books with Wesleyan include Partly: New and Selected Poems, Just Saying, Money Shot and Versed. In 2010 Versed won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and The National Book Critics Circle Award. Retired from UC San Diego where she was professor of poetry and poetics. She is the current judge of the Yale Younger Poets Prize.
Rebecca Brown's most recent book, YOU TELL THE STORIES YOU NEED TO BELIEVE, was published by Chatwin Books in March, 2022. Her other books (novels, short stories, essays, prose poems) include AMERICAN ROMANCES, THE HAUNTED HOUSE, THE DOGS:A MODERN BESTIARY, THE TERRIBLE GIRLS (all with City Lights), THE GIFTS OF THE BODY (HarperCollins) and NOT HEAVEN, SOMEWHERE ELSE (Tarpaulin Sky). She recently retired after 40 years of teaching and is currently putting together a book of essays.
Matthew Stadler is the author of Allan Stein, Landscape: Memory, The Dissolution of Nicholas Dee, and The Sex Offender. He is the recipient of Guggenheim and Ingram-Merrill fellowships, a Whiting Writer’s Award, and a United States Artists fellowship in the innaugural round. He edits the Fellow Travelers Series of books and is founder and editor at The GOAT PoL. He lives in Rotterdam and Seattle.
Event Venue
Elliott Bay Book Company, 1521 10th Ave, Seattle, United States