Cambridge Common Writers

Sybelia Drive in Conversation with Karin Cecile Davidson and Margot Livesey
2020-10-08 19:00 - 20:00 (America/Chicago) | Online Event
Join Pagination Bookshop in conversation with Karin Cecile Davidson (Fiction, June 2009) and Margot Livesey about their new books! Margot Livesey’s new novel, The Boy in the Field, was released in August 2020, and Karin Cecile Davidson’s new novel, Sybelia Drive, debuts October 2020!

In addition to Zoom, the event will also be live on their Facebook page.

If Not Now, When? Become the Poet You've Dreamed of Being
2020-10-10 14:00 - 16:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Join Lesley low-res MFA poetry faculty Erin Belieu and Kevin Prufer to talk about making poetry, mentorship and the writing life. Find out how a Lesley MFA, in the heart of the most fabled literary city in America, offers both flexibility and community in your busy life. All levels are experience are welcome. If you know any prospective students who might be interested, please send them the link!

Conversations with the Stage & Screen Writing Faculty: What We Love to Read and Write
2020-10-17 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Join Stage & Screen faculty Kate Snodgrass, Sinan Unel, Barry Brodsky and Jami Brandli for short presentations illustrating the way we teach, and an opportunity for attendees to ask questions.

So You Want to Write for Young People
2020-10-17 14:00 - 15:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Meet members of the Writing for Young People faculty Tracey Baptiste, David Elliott, and Mikki Knudsen as they discuss the features that make the Lesley MFA Program in Creative Writing distinct from other programs. There will be plenty of opportunity for Q & A.

Karin Cecile Davidson in conversation with Morgan Babst discussing Sybelia Drive
2020-10-22 18:00 - 19:00 UTC | Online Zoom Event
Join Karin Cecile Davidson (Fiction, June 2009) as she discusses her debut novel, Sybelia Drive, with New Orleans author, C. Morgan Babst (The Floating World: A Novel). The event is free but advanced registration is required.

Writing by Ear: Incorporating the Poetic, with Michael Mercurio
2020-10-24 09:30 - 12:30 (America/New_York) | Online Event
Every writer—no matter how accomplished they may be—feels the pressure of finding the right words to invigorate their manuscripts, to tell stories that resonate with readers and that linger for a long time. In this half-day workshop, writers will explore how the origins of words we use and the sounds of them can enhance their writing across any and all genres. Incorporating these poetic sensibilities into your work can help to create meaning you didn’t know was there and to get your work to stand out when it crosses an editor’s desk. This workshop will include a brief history lesson on the peculiarities of the English language, an opportunity to discuss some tried-and-true strategies for using words as springboards for inspiration, and plenty of time to write.

31st Annual Literacy for All Conference
2020-10-25 00:00 - 2020-10-27 23:59 (America/New_York) | Online Event
This year’s annual Literacy for All Conference will feature Lesley alumni, faculty and bestselling author Jason Reynolds (WFYP, MFA Writing Faculty), as well as many other leading literacy educators.

Register for three days of real-time professional development. The recorded sessions will be available on-demand for participants to reference at their convenience through the end of the year. This nationally renowned literacy and Reading Recovery conference for Pre-K-8 educators is ideal for classroom teachers, reading specialists, literacy coaches, interventionists, literacy leaders, administrators, and Reading Recovery teachers.

Blacksmith House Poetry Series: Listen by Steven Cramer
2020-10-26 19:15 - 20:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Founded in 1973, the award-winning Blacksmith House Poetry Series brings established and emerging writers of poetry and fiction to Harvard Square. Come listen to Poetry mentor Steven Cramer read from his latest poetry collection, Listen (limited spaces).

CCW Hosting Book Launch Party for Enzo Silon Surin's debut collection When My Body Was A Clinched Fist.
2020-10-30 19:00 - 20:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Join Cambridge Common Writers with poet and professor Enzo Silon Surin (Poetry) to celebrate his debut collection When My Body Was A Clinched Fist, published by Black Lawrence Press.

Goat Hill Writing Workshops with Ann Hood and Hester Kaplan
2020-11-02 12:00 - 13:00, 2020-11-09 12:00 - 13:00, 2020-11-16 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Join Ann and Hester (Fiction, MFA Writing Faculty) for an hour of writing prompts, critiques, and community! Writers of all stages in their writing lives welcome. A new workshop begins every Monday weeks of November 2, 9, and 16. Sessions are held 12:00 – 1:00pm Monday, Wednesday, and Friday on Zoom. Space is limited.

Cary Library Poetry Series: Listen by Steven Cramer
2020-11-05 19:00 - 20:30 (America/New_York) | Cary Memorial Library, 1874 Massachusetts Avenue, Lexington, Massachusetts, 02420, United States
Steven Cramer (Poetry, MFA Writing Faculty) reads from his latest poetry collection, Listen, at the Cary Library along with Jeffrey Harrison and Joyce Peseroff.

Enzo Silon Surin and Robbie Gamble read with Lily Poetry Salon
2020-11-12 19:00 - 21:00 (America/New_York) | Online Event
Join Enzo Silon Surin (Poetry) and Robbie Gamble (Poetry, January 2017) for readings from their works with the Lily Poetry Salon.

Listen: A Reading with Steven Cramer
2020-11-13 19:00 - 21:00 (America/New_York) | Online Event
Steven Cramer (Poetry, MFA Writing Faculty) reads from his new poetry collection, Listen, alongside Joyce Peseroff’s reading from Petition, her sixth book of poems.

Chapter and Verse: Adair, Gamble, Kittredge
2020-11-13 19:30 - 20:30 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Join the Jamaica Pond Poets for their second virtual reading in the Chapter and Verse Reading series! Featuring Robbie Gamble (Poetry, January 2017).

An Interactive Livestream Reading Series with Steven Cramer
2020-11-14 17:00 - 19:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
LIT BALM is a new weekly interactive livestream reading series from Marc Vincenz of MadHat and New American Writing (Magazine), Jonathan Penton of Unlikely Stories Mark V and Unlikely Books, and Larissa Shmailo of Scribes Media. This event features Steven Cramer (Poetry, MFA Writing Faculty) reading from his new poetry collection, Listen.

Les Bleues Literary Salon with Karin Cecile Davidson
2020-11-17 19:00 - 20:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Join Les Bleues Literary Salon for an online event with writers Jeff Bens, Sara Schaff, Tara Isabel Zambrano and our own Karin Cecile Davidson (Fiction, June 2009) and they talk about their works.

Poetry for Black Lives: A Reading and Conversation
2020-11-19 18:00 - 19:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Lesley University MFA Program in Creative Writing, the Boston Public Library, and the Boston Mayor’s Office of Arts & Culture present Poetry for Black Lives: A Reading and Conversation, which showcases contemporary elegies and critical ruminations from the recent volume Revisiting the Elegy in the Black Lives Matter Era (Routledge, 2020). The co-editors of the volume, Sequoia Maner, darlene anita scott, Emily Ruth Rutter, will join former Boston Poet Laureate and contributor to the volume, Danielle Legros Georges (Program Director), in conversation about the sociopolitical inequities and artistic impulses that compel Black elegy, as well as the roles that artists, activists, and teachers play in the Movement for Black Lives. BPL President David Leonard will introduce this program.

Lisa Gruenberg: My City of Dreams
2020-11-24 11:00 - 12:00 (America/New_York) | Online Event
In this second-generation Holocaust memoir, Gruenberg, confronted with her elderly father’s flashbacks, explores the life of her aunt Mia, who disappeared in Germany in 1941. After her father’s death, Gruenberg traveled to Vienna, Germany and Israel to explore this lost landscape, and to trace the fates of Mia, their extended family, friends and neighbors. Join Holocaust Museum LA and author Dr. Lisa Gruenberg (Nonfiction) to discuss her book, My City of Dreams in an online webinar.

Locating Me Chapbook Virtual Launch
2020-12-05 19:00 - 20:00 (America/New_York) | Online Event
Ella, Labrador Inuk (Nonfiction, June 2018), is involved in the BIPOC poetry group led by Straw Dog Writers’ Guild member Nicole M. Young. Their group met for six months and will have a chapbook published. They will have a reading on Zoom on December 5th. Attendees will be able to purchase the book prior to the event, which will have a meet and greet with contributors immediately after the reading.

Solidarity Salon: Virtual Version!
2020-12-05 19:00 - 21:00 (America/New_York) | Online Event
Lisa DeSiro (Poetry, June 2010) and Frances Donovan (Poetry, June 2019) will co-host this online event. The Solidarity Salon is a performance series that features literary, musical, visual, theater, and movement artists who gather together to share their creations and aims to especially amplify the voices of women, people of color, immigrants, LGBTQ+ persons, and those who are differently-abled.

Music by*Liz Anker*Deborah Yardley-Beers*Francine Trester

Readings by*Toni Bee*Robert Carr*Kelly DuMar*Judah Leblang*Frannie Lindsay*Gloria Mindock*Lee Okan*Anne Pluto*Renuka Raghavan

Readings on the Pike: December
2020-12-10 19:00 - 20:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
This online event will feature readings by our own Karin Cecile Davidson (Fiction, June 2009), as well as E.A. Aymar, Nandini Bhattacharya, Katie Gutierrez, Liliana Morrison, Danielle Williams, Lauren Woods, Benjamin Woodard, and Danielle Zaccagnino.

Author Talk: Lisa Gruenberg City of Dreams
2020-12-10 19:00 - 20:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Celebrate the first night of Chanukah with the Vilna and author Lisa Gruenberg (Nonfiction, June 2007). In the early 2000s, a family crisis set Boston physician Lisa Gruenberg on the unexpected path to being a writer. In 2012, she received a Massachusetts Cultural Council Artist Fellowship in Fiction/Creative Nonfiction and in 2019, she published her memoir My City of Dreams. Join her for reflections on writing, being a doctor during these trying times, and the holiday of lights.

Chapter and Verse featuring Steven Cramer's "Listen"
2020-12-11 19:30 - 21:30 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Chapter and Verse is a free literary reading series sponsored by the Jamaica Pond Poets, usually on the second Friday of the month, from October through May. The operating committee members are Dorothy Derifield, Sandra Storey, Susanna Kittridge, Jennifer Markell, and Alan Smith Soto.

Events have three readers followed by free refreshments. Open to all.

Virtual Poetry at the Library Series: featuring Steven Cramer & Joyce Peseroff
2020-12-13 15:00 - 16:30 (America/New_York) | Online Event
Steven Cramer (Poetry, MFA Writing Faculty) reads from his sixth collection, Listen (MadHat Press, 2020), lucid, smart portrayals of the “darker corners” of despair through scores of illuminating juxtapositions. Experimenting with many verse forms to give shape to the mind’s restless shifts and associations—sometimes absurdly funny, bracingly honest, and always sharp in thought and craft—the lyric testimony of Listen reaffirms the indispensable, if fragile, consolations of art. He is joined by Joyce Peseroff reading from her sixth collection, Petition (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2020).

Wintonbury Library Poetry Series with Lori Desrosiers
2020-12-17 19:00 - 20:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Spark your creativity, make connections, and share the gift of poetry! The P. Faith McMahon Wintonbury Library offers readings by notable poets and a warm, supportive atmosphere for sharing your own work. Featured poets for this event are Lori Desrosiers (Poetry, MFA Writing Faculty) and Benjamin Grossberg. Open mic follows the featured poets. Sign up during registration or email Tom at tnicotera@libraryconnection.info.

Hidden Timber Reading Series featuring Karin Cecile Davidson
2020-12-20 15:00 - 16:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
In light of so many cancelled book tours as of late, Hidden Timber Books is hosting other small press authors via Zoom for readings. Join them and alum Karin Cecile Davidson (Fiction, June 2009) as they discuss her debut novel, Sybelia Drive.

What The Universe Is: Allison Adair, Enzo Silon Surin, Lauren Camp, Michael Mercurio
2021-01-07 19:30 - 20:30 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Join Allison Adair, Enzo Silon Surin (Poetry, 2012), Lauren Camp, and Michael Mercurio (Poetry, January 2017) for the debut launch of the reading series “What The Universe Is.” Allison, Enzo, and Lauren have all had books out in 2020, the links to which can be found here.

Lesley University MFA in Creative Writing Reading Series - Chris Lynch & Jami Brandli
2021-01-08 18:00 - 19:00 (America/New_York) | Online Zoom Event
Chris Lynch has never been a New York Times bestselling author, not even close. But he has been publishing young-adult and middle-grade novels since 1993. One of them was a National Book Award finalist, and another was a Michael L. Printz award honor book. His next YA novel, Walkin’ the Dog, will be out with Simon & Schuster in 2022, probably.

Jami Brandli’s award-winning plays include Technicolor Life, Sisters Three, Through the Eye of a Needle, O: A Rhapsody in Divorce, Visiting Hours and BLISS (or Emily Post is Dead!). Her work has been produced and developed at venues including the New Dramatists, the New York Theatre Workshop, The Women’s Voices Theater Festival, and The Inkwell Theater. Her short works are published with Theatre Communications Group, Dramatic Publishing Company and Smith & Kraus.
