Mira Sethi in conversation with Miranda Popkey, celebrating Mira Sethi's new short fiction collection "Are You Enjoying?" published by Alfred Knopf. This event was originally broadcast live via Zoom and hosted by Peter Maravelis.

You can purchase copies of "Are You Enjoying?" directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/staff-picks-archive/are-you-enjoying-stories/

Mira Sethi is an actor and a writer. She grew up in Lahore and attended Wellesley College, after which Sethi worked as a books editor at The Wall Street Journal. She has written op-ed pieces for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Guardian. Sethi regularly appears in a mainstream Pakistani drama series on television. She lives in Lahore, Karachi, and San Francisco.

Miranda Popkey is a writer, editor, and translator from the Italian. Her writing has appeared in The New Republic, The New Yorker’s page-turner blog, The Paris Review Daily, The Hairpin,  New York’s magazine “The Cut,” and many others. Her debut novel, “Topics of Conversation,” was published by Alfred Knopf in 2020. She currently resides in Massachusetts with her husband and dog.

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation

Mira Sethi in Conversation with Miranda Popkey

Nathaniel Mackey in conversation with Fred Moten, celebrating the launch of his new poetry collection, "Double Trio," published by New Directions. This event was originally broadcast via Zoom and hosted by Josiah Luis Alderete.

You can purchase copies of "Double Trio" directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/staff-picks/double-trio-tej-bet-sos-notice-nerv/

Nathaniel Mackey was born in Miami, Florida, in 1947. He is the author of several books of fiction of "exquisite rhythmic lyricism" (Bookforum), poetry, and criticism and has received many awards for his work, including the National Book Award in poetry for Splay Anthem, the Stephen Henderson Award from the African American Literature and Culture Society, the Bollingen Prize, and the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. Mackey is the Reynolds Price Professor of English at Duke University.

Fred Moten is an American cultural theorist, poet, and scholar whose work explores critical studies, black studies, and performance studies. Moten is Professor of Performance Studies at New York University and Distinguished Professor Emeritus at University of California, Riverside and the University of Iowa. His scholarly texts include "The Undercommons: Fugitive Planning & Black Study" which was co-authored with Stefano Harney, "In the Break: The Aesthetics of the Black Radical Tradition," and "The Universal Machine" (Duke University Press, 2018). He has published numerous poetry collections, including The Little Edges, The Feel Trio, B Jenkins, and Hughson's Tavern. In 2020, Moten was awarded a for "[c]reating new conceptual spaces to accommodate emerging forms of Black aesthetics, cultural production, and social life."

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation

Nathaniel Mackey with Fred Moten

A tribute to Diane di Prima, marking one year since her passing in October 2020, with Hanif Abdurraqib, Garrett Caples, Jeanne di Prima, Sheppard Powell, Cedar Sigo, Sunnylyn Thibodeaux, Wendy Trevino, and Jenny Jo Wennlund. This event was originally broadcast live via Zoom and hosted by Peter Maravelis.

This event was sponsored by the City Lights Foundation and Lost & Found: The CUNY Poetics Document Initiative.

You can purchase copies of "Revolutionary Letters" directly from City Lights at a 30% discount here: https://citylights.com/beat-literature-poetry-history/revolutionary-letters-50th-anniver/

Other books by Diane di Prima can be purchased directly from the City Lights Bookstore here: citylights.com/author/diane-di-prima/

City Lights events calendar: https://citylights.com/events/

Diane di Prima Memorial Tribute Pt. 1: Revolutionary Letters and Other Poems

In conjunction with MAPS (the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies)and Synergetic Press, City Lights presents "Psyche Unbound," a day-long appreciation of Stanislav Grof.

"Early Witnesses and Allies" is the first session of the day-long symposium in three sessions, exploring the life and work of Stanislav Grof, the world’s leading researcher in psychedelic therapy, breathwork, and the exploration of non-ordinary states of consciousness.

A storytelling event and tribute with Stanislav and Brigitte Grof joined by Rick Tarnas, Sean Kelly, Rick Doblin, Susan Hess Logeals (Producer of the film "Way of the Psychonaut"), Will Keepin, and Diane Haug. Moderated by David Presti, with an opening statement from Peter Maravelis. This event was originally broadcast live via Zoom on Saturday, January 22, 2022. 

The event coincided with the launch of the new book: 
"Psyche Unbound: Essays in Honor of Stanislav Grof" 
Edited by Richard Tarnas, Ph.D. and Sean Kelly, Ph.D. and published by MAPS, with Synergetic Press.

You can purchase copies of "Psyche Unbound: Essays in Honor of Stanislav Grof" directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/cognitive-science/psyche-unbound-tribute-to-stan-groff/

Special Thanks to the following for their support of this event: California Institute of Integral Studies, Tam Integration, Psychedelic Seminars, Esalen Institute, Psychedelic Society UK, Psychedelics Today, and DoubleBlind Mag.

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: https://citylights.com/foundation/

Psyche Unbound Session 1: Early Witnesses and Allies

An appreciation of Jack Kerouac’s unique contribution to American literature with talks by Ann Charters, Jean-Christophe Cloutier, Ann Douglas, Tim Hunt, Joyce Johnson, Hassan Melehy, and Regina Weinreich, with readings by Tony Torn, and a birthday greeting by David Amram. This event was originally broadcast live via Zoom and hosted by Peter Maravelis.

On Thursday, March 10, 2022, City Lights, at the birthplace of the San Francisco Renaissance and the Beat movement, celebrated Jack Kerouac’s centenary, with an illuminating exploration of his writing. Moving beyond the hype and fetishization of his personality, some of the country's leading Kerouac scholars take a deep dive into his work. Learn about books you haven’t yet read, his innovations in prose, the influence of his Franco-American background and how he discovered his unique voice.

City Light features one of the largest selection of Jack Kerouac books in the world. Check out our stock at this link: https://citylights.com/author/jack-kerouac/

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation/

Still Outside: Jack Kerouac at 100

Farah Jasmine Griffin in conversation with Robin D.G. Kelley, discussing her new book "Read Until You Understand: The Profound Wisdom of Black Life and Literature," published by W.W. Norton & Co. This event was originally broadcast via Zoom and hosted by Josiah Luis Alderete.

You can purchase copies of "Read Until You Understand: The Profound Wisdom of Black Life and Literature" directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/new-nonfiction-in-hardcover/read-until-you-understand/

Farah Jasmine Griffin is a professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania. She is the author of "Who Set You Flowin'?": The African-American Migration Narrative, and the coeditor of "A Stranger in the Village: Two Centuries of African-American Travel Writing." She has been the recipient of fellowships from the Ford Foundation and the Bunting Institute at Radcliffe College. She lives in Philadelphia.

Robin D.G. Kelley is a scholar history of social movements in the U.S., the African Diaspora, and Africa; black intellectuals; music and visual culture; Surrealism, Marxism, among other things. His essays have appeared in a wide variety of professional journals as well as general publications, including the Journal of American History, American Historical Review, The Nation, Monthly Review, New York Times, Color Lines, Counterpunch, Souls, Black Renaissance/Renaissance Noir, Social Text ,The Black Scholar, Journal of Palestine Studies, and  Boston Review, for which he serves as Contributing Editor. He is the author of "Africa Speaks, America Answers: Modern Jazz in Revolutionary Times" (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2012); "Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original" (The Free Press, 2009); "Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination" (Beacon Press, 2002); with Howard Zinn and Dana Frank, "Three Strikes: The Fighting Spirit of Labor's Last Century" (Beacon Press, 2001); "Yo’ Mama’s Disfunktional!: Fighting the Culture Wars in Urban America"(Boston: Beacon Press, 1997); "Race Rebels: Culture, Politics, and the Black Working Class" (New York: The Free Press, 1994); "Into the Fire: African Americans Since 1970" (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996) [Vol. 10 of the Young Oxford History of African Americans series]; "Hammer and Hoe: Alabama Communists During the Great Depression" (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1990).

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation

Farah Jasmine Griffin in Conversation with Robin D.G. Kelley

Ingrid Rojas Contreras in conversation with Esmé Weijun Wang, celebrating the launch of "The Man Who Could Move Clouds: A Memoir," published by Doubleday. This live event took place in Kerouac Alley, between City Lights and Vesuvio Cafe, and was hosted by Peter Maravelis.

You can purchase copies of "The Man Who Could Move Clouds: A Memoir" directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/new-nonfiction-in-hardcover/man-who-could-move-clouds/

Ingrid Rojas Contreras was born and raised in Bogotá, Colombia. Her first novel "Fruit of the Drunken Tree" was the silver medal winner in First Fiction from the California Book Awards, and a New York Times editor’s choice. Her essays and short stories have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, The Believer, and Zyzzyva, among others. She lives in California.

Esmé Weijun Wang is a novelist and essayist. She is the author of the New York Times-bestselling essay collection, "The Collected Schizophrenias"(2019), and a debut novel, "The Border of Paradise," which was called a Best Book of 2016 by NPR. She was named by Granta as one of the “Best of Young American Novelists” in 2017 and won the Whiting Award in 2018. Born in the Midwest to Taiwanese parents, she is the founder of The Unexpected Shape™ Writing Academy for ambitious writers living with limitations. She can be found at esmewang.com and on Twitter @esmewang.

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation

Ingrid Rojas Contreras in Conversation with Esmé Weijun Wang

Elif Batuman in conversation with Lucy Corin, celebrating the publication of "Either/Or: a novel" by Elif Batuman, published by Penguin Press. This event was originally broadcast via Zoom and hosted by Peter Maravelis.

You can purchase copies of "Either/Or: a novel" directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/new-fiction-in-hardcover/either-or/

Elif Batuman’s first novel, "The Idiot," was a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize, and was shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction in the UK. She is also the author of "The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them," which was a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award in criticism. She has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 2010 and holds a PhD in comparative literature from Stanford University.

Lucy Corin is the author of the novel "The Swank Hotel," as well as the story collections "One Hundred Apocalypses and Other Apocalypses" and "The Entire Predicament," and the novel "Everyday Psychokillers: A History for Girls." Her work has appeared in American Short Fiction, Conjunctions, Harper’s Magazine, Ploughshares, Bomb, Tin House Magazine, and the New American Stories anthology from Vintage Contemporaries. She is the recipient of an American Academy of Arts and Letters Rome Prize and a literature fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. She teaches at the University of California at Davis and lives in Berkeley.

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation

Elif Batuman in Conversation with Lucy Corin

City Lights presents Sam Woolley in conversation with Jeff Horwitz.  Sam Woolley celebrates the publication of his new book “Manufacturing Consensus: Understanding Propaganda in the Era of Automation and Anonymity”, published by Yale University Press. This virtual event was hosted by Peter Maravelis.

You can purchase copies of "Manufacturing Consensus" directly from City Lights here: citylights.com/manufacturing-consensus-propaganda-in/

Samuel Woolley is assistant professor of journalism and media, program director of the Propaganda Research Lab, and Knight Faculty Fellow at the Center for Media Engagement at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the author of “The Reality Game: How the Next Wave of Technology Will Break the Truth”.

Jeff Horwitz is an award-winning technology reporter for The Wall Street Journal based in San Francisco. His reporting has won repeated recognition, including a Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing award and a Gerald Loeb Awards finalist citation for articles he produced with two colleagues about Facebook’s struggle to police hate in India. Previously he was a financial and enterprise reporter for the Associated Press in Washington, D.C., where his work earned him the Christopher J. Welles Memorial Prize from the Knight-Bagehot Fellowship.

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation

Sam Woolley in conversation with Jeff Horwitz

City Lights in conjunction with Asian American Writers’ Workshop and University of California Press present a tribute to the life and work of Theresa Hak Kyung Cha. Moderated by Linda Norton with appearances by Brandon Shimoda, Min Sun Jeon, and Christina Yang celebrating the publication of two new books from University of California Press: "Dictee" and "Exilee and Temps Morts: Selected Works." This event was originally broadcast via Zoom and hosted by Peter Maravelis.

You can purchase copies of "Dictee" directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/general-fiction/dictee-2/
And "Exilee and Temps Morts: Selected Works" here:https://citylights.com/general-poetry/exilee-temps-morts-sel-works/

Theresa Hak Kyung Cha (1951–1982) was a poet, filmmaker, and artist who earned her BA and MA in comparative literature and her BA and MFA in art from the University of California, Berkeley. During her brief yet brilliant career, Theresa Hak Kyung Cha explored a variety of media, including handmade books, video, film, sculpture, performance, and sound. Her work is distinctive for its somber, unforgettable beauty, its innovative treatment of texts and images, and its ongoing, rigorous exploration of the phenomena of physical, cultural, and linguistic displacement. One element linking much of her work is an abiding concern with film and film theory. Cha’s aesthetic influences are to be found much less among contemporary artists than among the works of filmmakers such as Chris Marker, Yasujiro Ozu, Jean-Luc Goddard, Marguerite Duras, Michael Snow, and above all, Carl Th. Dreyer. She was especially influenced by their innovative treatments of narrative and their concern for problems of memory, communication, and consciousness. Cha was also influenced by her studies of French film theory, particularly the scholarship of Christian Metz, Jean-Louis Baudry, Thierry Kuntzel, and Bertrand Augst. From these theorists, Cha developed an awareness of the artwork as an extended “apparatus,” the meaning of which was inscribed between its psychological origin in the artist, its material and temporal existence, and its destination in the viewer’s consciousness. While Cha developed her response to these ideas particularly in her live performances, they can be seen to have considerably influenced her work in other media as well. Cha, who died tragically in New York City in 1982, received her MFA from the University of California at Berkeley in 1978, and was an employee of the University Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (Special thanks to BAMPFA for the use of this biography).

The Asian American Writers’ Workshop (AAWW) is a national literary nonprofit dedicated to publishing and incubating work by Asian and Asian diasporic writers, poets, and artists. Since their founding in 1991, they have provided a countercultural literary arts space at the intersection of migration, race, and social justice. Find out more at aaww.org.

To learn more about the speakers in this tribute, visit: https://citylights.com/events/dreaming-of-theresa-hak-kyung-cha-an-appreciation/ 

And if you would like to see any of the visuals shared during this event, you can check out the video on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBZ_-hEqC3c

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation

Dreaming of Theresa Hak Kyung Cha: An Appreciation

LIVE! From City Lights welcomes poet, critic, theorist and McArthur fellow Fred Moten in celebration of his latest poetry collection, “perennial fashion presence falling.” 

In conversation with award-winning poet Douglas Kearney, Moten shares some pieces from his book, which hold an innate quantum curiosity about the infinitude of the present and the ways in which one could observe the history of the future. Moten approaches the sublime, relishing the intermediary space of microtonal thought.  

Fred Moten works in the Departments of Performance Studies and Comparative Literature at New York University. He is concerned with social movement ,aesthetic experiment and black study and has written a number of books of poetry and criticism, including National Book Award finalist “The Feel Trio.” Moten is a MacArthur Fellow, a Guggenheim Fellow and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. 

You can purchase copies of “perennial fashion presence falling” directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/266548/

This was a virtual event hosted by Douglas Kearney and made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation.

Fred Moten in conversation with Douglas Kearney

LIVE! From City Lights celebrates author Robert Greenfield and his latest publication “True West: Sam Shepard’s Life, Work, and Times.” 

Much like Greenfield’s previous biographies, “True West” delves deeply into the life of world-famous playwright and actor Sam Shepard, whose work was matched by his equally dramatic life and relationships. Greenfield interviewed dozens of people who knew Shepard well, and makes the case for Shepard as not just a great American writer but a unique figure who first brought the sensibility of rock ‘n’ roll to theater. 

Robert Greenfield is an award-winning novelist, screenwriter, playwright, and the author of “Bill Graham Presents: My Life Inside Rock and Out.” He lives in California. 

You can purchase copies of “True West: Sam Shepard’s Life, Work, and Times” directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/true-west-sam-shepards-life-work/

This was a virtual event hosted by Peter Maravelis, in conjunction with Crown Books, and made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation.

Robert Greenfield discussing the life and work of Sam Shepard

LIVE! From City Lights celebrates author Mircea Cărtărescu and his latest publication, “Solenoid.” 

Grounded in the reality of late 1970s/early 1980s Communist Romania, Solenoid ruminates on the exchange possible between the alternate dimensions of life and art, as various, monstrous dimensions erupt within the Communist present. 

Mircea Cărtărescu is a Romanian novelist, poet, short-story writer, literary critic, and essayist. He has published more than twenty-five books. His work has received the Formentor Prize (2018), the Thomas Mann Prize (2018), the Austrian State Prize for Literature (2015), and the Vilenica Prize (2011), among many others. His work has been translated in twenty-three languages. His novels include “Blinding” (published by Archipelago Books,) “Nostalgia” (published by New Directions) and “Solenoid” (published by Deep Vellum.)

You can purchase copies of “Solenoid” directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/solenoid-tr-sean-cotter/

This was a virtual event hosted by Peter Maravelis, in conjunction with Deep Vellum and the Romanian Cultural Institute, and made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation.

Mircea Cărtărescu in conversation with Mauro Javier Cardenas

City Lights LIVE presents Brandon Shimoda and Emily Luan reading from their books,“Hydra Medusa” and “In 回 / Return,” published by Nightboat Books.

“Hydra Medusa” by Brandon Simoda takes us through the poet's day-to-day life as he works five jobs and raises his child. His collection of poems and essays touches on the realities of living on the US-Mexico border. Shimoda documents the realities and oftentimes horrors of living in the desert as he encounters his own past and ancestry as a Japanese American individual. Brandon Shimoda is a poet and author of eight books of poetry and prose. He teaches at Colorado College. 

“In 回 / Return” by Emily Luan is rooted in the classical tradition of the Chinese “reversible” poem. "In 回 / Return” is engaged in the act of looking back—toward an imagined homeland and a childhood of suburban longing, through migratory passages, departures, and etymologies, and into the various holes and voids that appear in the telling and retelling of history. Emily Luan is a former Margins Fellow at the Asian American Writers’ Workshop. 

You can purchase copies of "Hydra Medusa” and “In 回 / Return” at https://citylights.com/.

Brandon Shimoda with Emily Luan

City Lights LIVE presents John Szwed in conversation with Raymond Foye celebrating the publication of “Cosmic Scholar: The Life and Times of Harry Smith,” published by Farrar, Straus, Giroux. 

“Cosmic Scholar" follows the life and legacy of Harry Smith, the brilliant eccentric who transformed twentieth century art and culture. He was an anthropologist, filmmaker, painter, folklorist, mystic, and walking encyclopedia. He taught Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe about the occult, swapped drugs with Timothy Leary, sat at the piano with Thelonious Monk, lived with (and tortured) Allen Ginsberg, argued film with Susan Sontag, and received one of the first Guggenheim grants. He was always broke, always intoxicated, compulsively irascible, and unimpeachably authentic. Harry Smith was, in the words of Robert Frank, “the only person I met in my life that transcended everything.” 

In “Cosmic Scholar”, John Szwed patches together, for the first time, the life of one of the twentieth century’s most overlooked cultural figures. 

John Szwed is the author or editor of many books, including biographies of Billie Holiday, Miles Davis, Sun Ra, and Alan Lomax. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation, and in 2005 was awarded a Grammy for “Doctor Jazz”, a book included with the album Jelly Roll Morton: The Complete Library of Congress Recordings by Alan Lomax. A former Professor of Anthropology, African American Studies, and Film Studies for 26 years at Yale University, he was also a Professor of Music and Jazz Studies at Columbia University, and served as the Chair of the Department of Folklore and Folklife at the University of Pennsylvania. He lives in Philadelphia with his family. 

Raymond Foye is a writer, curator, editor and publisher. From 1978-80 he worked as a literary editor with City Lights Books where he edited “The Unknown Poe” (1980). He also edited two issues (Nos 29 & 30) of Beatitude magazine. His show The Heavenly Tree Grows Downward (James Cohan Gallery, New York) was the first exhibition to feature the artworks of Harry Smith, and was named one of the ten best exhibitions of 2002 by the New York Times (Holland Cotter). He is also currently preparing an edition of “Cosmologies: The Naropa Lectures of Harry Smith”, to be published in October 2023. 

You can purchase copies of “Cosmic Scholar: The Life and Times of Harry Smith” at https://citylights.com/cosmic-scholar-life-times-harry-smit/  

This event is made possible with the support of the City Lights Foundation. To learn more visit: https://citylights.com/foundation/

John Szwed discussing the life and work of Harry Smith

Jordan Elgrably in conversation with Sarah AlKahly-Mills, with readings from both authors. 

City Lights celebrates the publication of "Stories from the Center of the World: New Middle East Fiction," edited by Jordan Elgrably, published by City Lights Books.

You can purchase copies directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/stories-from-the-center-of-the-world/

"Stories from the Center of the World" gathers new writing from 25 emerging and established writers of Middle Eastern and North African origins, offering a unique collection of voices and viewpoints that illuminate life in the global Arab/Muslim world. The authors included in the book come from a wide range of cultures and countries, including Palestine, Syria, Pakistan, Iran, Lebanon, Egypt, and Morocco.

In “Asha and Haaji,” Hanif Kureishi takes up the cause of outsiders who become uprooted when war or disaster strikes and they flee for safe haven. In Nektaria Anastasiadou‘s “The Location of the Soul According to Benyamin Alhadeff,” two students in Istanbul from different classes — and religions that have often been at odds with one another — believe they can overcome all obstacles. MK Harb‘s story, “Counter Strike,” is about queer love among Beiruti adolescents; and Salar Abdoh‘s “The Long Walk of the Martyrs” invites us into the world of former militants, fighters who fought ISIS or Daesh in Iraq and Syria, who are having a hard time readjusting to civilian life. In “Eleazar,” Karim Kattan tells an unexpected Palestinian story in which the usual antagonists — Israeli occupation forces — are mostly absent, while another malevolent force seems to overtake an unsuspecting family. Omar El Akkad‘s “The Icarist” is a coming-of-age story about the underworld in which illegal immigrants are forced to live, and what happens when one dares to break away.

Contributors include: Salar Abdoh, Leila Aboulela, Farah Ahamed, Omar El Akkad, Sarah AlKahly-Mills, Nektaria Anastasiadou, Amany Kamal Eldin, Jordan Elgrably, Omar Foda, May Haddad, Danial Haghighi, Malu Halasa, MK Harb, Alireza Iranmehr, Karim Kattan, Hanif Kureishi, Ahmed Salah Al-Mahdi, Diary Marif, Tariq Mehmood, Sahar Mustafah, Mohammed Al-Naas, Ahmed Naji, Mai Al-Nakib, Abdellah Taia, and Natasha Tynes.

Jordan Elgrably is a Franco-American and Moroccan writer and translator, whose stories and creative nonfiction have appeared in numerous anthologies and reviews, including Apulée, Salmagundi, and The Paris Review. Editor-in-chief and founder of The Markaz Review, he is the cofounder and former director of the Levantine Cultural Center/The Markaz in Los Angeles (2001-2020), and producer of the stand-up comedy show “The Sultans of Satire” (2005-2017) and hundreds of other public programs. He is based in Montpellier, France and California.

Sarah AlKahly-Mills is a Lebanese-American writer. Her story “The Salamander” is included in the new book "Stories from the Center of the World: New Middle East Fiction," edited by Jordan Elgrably, and just published by City Lights. Her fiction, poetry, book reviews, and essays have appeared in publications including Litro Magazine, Ink and Oil, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Michigan Quarterly Review, PopMatters, Al-Fanar Media, Middle East Eye, and various university journals. Born in Burbank, CA, she now lives in Rome, Italy.

Originally hosted live in City Lights' Poetry Room on Thursday, May 9, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis. 

Made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation cosponsored with Golden Thread Productions. citylights.com/foundation

Jordan Elgrably with Sarah AlKahly-Mills

Kit Schluter celebrates the publication of "Cartoons," (City Lights) & Garrett Caples celebrates the publication of "Proses: Incomparable Parables! Fabulous Fables! Cruel Tales!" (Wave Books).

Purchase "Cartoons:" https://citylights.com/city-lights-published/cartoons/
Purchase "Proses:" https://citylights.com/general-fiction/proses-incomparable-parables-fabulous/

About "Cartoons:"
Set in the uncanny valley between Bugs Bunny & Franz Kafka, "Cartoons" is an explosive series of outrageous, absurdist tales. "Cartoons" proposes itself as a genre of imaginary writing in opposition to the realism of most contemporary U.S. fiction, aligning itself with the French symbolism & Latin American fabulism its author is known to translate. A giant cricket with a tiny Kit Schluter in a jar, an umbrella who confuses the words porpoise and purpose in its quest for self-fulfillment, a pair of slugs go on a bender, these are just a few denizens of its pages, suffused with a fairy tale-like animism. A microwave oven decries microaggressions. A beer bottle is filled with regret. An escalator mechanic’s shoe conceals a terrible secret.

Kit Schluter’s recent work has appeared in Boston Review, BOMB, & Brooklyn Rail. He is author of the poetry collection "Pierrot’s Fingernails" (Canarium Books) as well as numerous chapbooks & artist editions of poems & stories. Schluter is included in the latest edition of "Best American Experimental Writing" (Wesleyan UP, 2020), edited by Carmen Maria Machado, Joyelle McSweeney, Jesse Damiani & Seth Abramson. He has translated widely from French & Spanish, including works by Rafael Bernal (New Directions), Marcel Schwob (Wakefield Press), & Olivia Tapiero (Nightboat Books). He recently illustrated Sebastian Castillo’s novel "SALMON." Kit coordinates production & design for Nightboat Books and lives in Mexico City.

About "Proses:"
In the grand tradition of poet’s fiction, "Proses: Incomparable Parables! Fabulous Fables! Cruel Tales!" is a collection of nine phantasmagorical stories by poet & City Lights editor, Garrett Caples.
Turning its back on the ethos of traditional narrative, "Proses" draws on Marcel Schwob, magical realism, & speculative fiction for inspiration, projecting worlds dominated by dream logic & impossible  dimensions. Spectral nuns, xenobots, explosive phraseology, & even Ringo Starr are some of the unexpected dilemmas confronting the various protagonists. Poets such as Andrew Joron, Kit Schluter, & Claude Grind make cameo appearances. While each story is a standalone, the collection amounts to an intricate whole, as themes, objects, & characters recur, encouraging readers to enjoy the book sequentially. Regardless of how it's enjoyed, "Proses" is both a satire of the world of contemporary poetry & a celebration of that world’s fantastic, infinite imagination.

Garrett Caples is the author of "Lovers of Today" (Wave Books, 2021), "Power Ballads" (Wave Books, 2016), "Complications" (2007), & "The Garrett Caples Reader" (1999), a collection of outtakes, "The Rise & Fall of Johnny Volume" (2020), & a bilingual selection, "Noches Apátridas" (Unstated Nights, 2019). He’s also written a book of essays, "Retrievals" (2014), & a pamphlet, "Quintessence of the Minor" (2010). He’s the editor of Philip Lamantia’s "Preserving Fire: Selected Prose" (2018), Samuel Greenberg’s "Poems from the Greenberg MSS" (2019), & Michael McClure’s "Mule Kick Blues and Last Poems" (2021), as well as the co-editor of "The Collected Poems of Philip Lamantia" (2013), "Particulars of Place" (2015) by Richard O. Moore, "Incidents of Travel in Poetry: New and Selected Poems" (2016) by Frank Lima, & "Arcana: A Stephen Jonas Reader" (2019). He is an editor at City Lights Books, where he curates the Spotlight Poetry Series.

Originally broadcast from City Lights' Poetry Room on Thursday, May 22, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis. Made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation. citylights.com/foundation

Kit Schluter with Garrett Caples

Judith Butler discusses their new book "Who’s Afraid of Gender?" published by Farrar Straus Giroux. Named a "Most Anticipated Book of 2024" by Time, Elle, Kirkus, Literary Hub, The Millions, & Electric Literature.

Purchase book here: https://citylights.com/whos-afraid-of-gender/

Judith Butler, the groundbreaking thinker whose iconic book "Gender Trouble" redefined how we think about gender & sexuality, confronts the attacks on “gender” that have become central to right-wing movements today. Global networks have formed “anti-gender ideology movements” that are dedicated to circulating a fantasy that gender is a dangerous, perhaps diabolical, threat to families, local cultures, civilization—& even “man” himself. Inflamed by the rhetoric of public figures, this movement has sought to nullify reproductive justice, undermine protections against sexual & gender violence, & strip trans & queer people of their rights to pursue a life without fear of violence.

The aim of "Who’s Afraid of Gender?" is not to offer a new theory of gender but to examine how “gender” has become a phantasm for emerging authoritarian regimes, fascist formations, & transexclusionary feminists. In their vital, courageous new book, Butler illuminates the concrete ways that this phantasm of “gender” collects & displaces anxieties & fears of destruction. Operating in tandem with deceptive accounts of “critical race theory” & xenophobic panics about migration, the anti-gender movement demonizes struggles for equality, fuels aggressive nationalism, & leaves millions of people vulnerable to subjugation.

An essential intervention into one of the most fraught issues of our moment, "Who’s Afraid of Gender?" is a bold call to refuse the alliance with authoritarian movements & to make a broad coalition with all those whose struggle for equality is linked with fighting injustice. Imagining new possibilities for both freedom & solidarity, Butler offers us a hopeful work of social and political analysis that is both timely and timeless.

Judith Butler is the author of several books including "Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity," "Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of 'Sex'," "The Psychic Life of Power: Theories of Subjection, Excitable Speech, Notes Toward a Performative Theory of Assembly," & "The Force of Non-Violence." In addition to numerous academic honors & publications, Butler has published editorials & reviews in The Guardian, The New Statesman, The Nation, Time Magazine, the London Review of Books, & in a wide range of journals, newspapers, radio & podcast programs throughout Europe, Latin America, Central & South Asia, & South Africa. They live in Berkeley.

Maggie Nelson is the author of several acclaimed books of poetry & prose, including "Like Love: Essays and Conversations" (2024), the national bestseller "On Freedom: Four Songs of Care and Constraint" (2021), National Book Critics Circle Award winner and international bestseller "The Argonauts" (2015), "The Art of Cruelty: A Reckoning" (2011), "Bluets" (2009; named by Bookforum as one of the top 10 best books of the past 20 years), "The Red Parts: Autobiography of a Trial" (2007), & "Women, the New York School, & Other True Abstractions" (2007), "Something Bright, Then Holes" (2007), & "Jane: A Murder" (2005; finalist, the PEN/ Martha Albrand Art of the Memoir). A recipient of a 2016 MacArthur “genius” Fellowship, she is currently a professor of English at the University of Southern California.

Originally broadcast from City Lights' Poetry Room on Thursday, March 28, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis. Made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation. citylights.com/foundation

Judith Butler with Maggie Nelson

City Lights & Semiotext(e) celebrate the publication of "Stubble Archipelago" by Wayne Koestenbaum with a conversation between the author & Tausif Noor.

Purchase here: https://citylights.com/stubble-archipelago/

Wild new adventures in word-infatuated flânerie from a celebrated literary provocateur. This book of thirty-six poetic bulletins by the humiliation-advice-giver Wayne Koestenbaum will teach you how to cruise, dream, decode a crowded consciousness, find nuggets of satisfaction in unaccustomed corners, & sew a language glove roomy enough to contain materials gathered while meandering. Koestenbaum wrote many of these poems while walking around New York City. He’d jot down phrases in a notebook or dictate them into his phone. At home, he’d incorporate these fragmented gleanings into overflowing quasi sonnets. Thus each poem functions as a coded diary entry, including specific references to sidewalk events & peripatetic perceptions. Flirting, remembering, eavesdropping, gazing, squeezing, sequestering: Koestenbaum invents a novel way to cram dirty liberty into the tight yet commodious space of the sonnet, a fourteen-lined cruise ship that contains ample suites for behavior modification, libidinal experiment, aura-filled memory orgies, psychedelic Bildungsromane, lap dissolves, archival plunges, & other mental saunterings that conjure the unlikely marriage of Kenneth Anger & Marianne Moore. Carnal pudding, anyone? These engorged lyrics don’t rhyme; & though each builds on a carapace of fourteen lines, many of the lines spawn additional, indented tributaries, like hoop earrings dangling from the stanzas’ lobes. Koestenbaum’s poems are comic, ribald, compressed, symphonic. They take liberties with ordinary language, & open up new pockets for sensation in the sorrowing overcoat of the “now.” Stubble—a libidinal detail—matters when you’re stranded on the archipelago of your most unsanctioned yet tenaciously harbored impulses.

Wayne Koestenbaum—poet, critic, novelist, artist, performer—has published nineteen books, including "The Queen’s Throat," a groundbreaking study of sexuality & the human voice which was a National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist. Additional books to his credit include: "Camp Marmalade," "Notes on Glaze," "The Pink Trance Notebooks," "My 1980s & Other Essays," "Hotel Theory," "The Anatomy of Harpo Marx," "Humiliation," "Jackie Under My Skin," & "The Cheerful Scapegoat." His essays & poems have been widely published in periodicals & anthologies, including "The Best American Poetry," "The Best American Essays," The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Paris Review, London Review of Books, The Believer, The Iowa Review, Cabinet, and Artforum. Formerly an Associate Professor of English at Yale & a Visiting Professor in the Yale School of Art’s painting department, he is a Distinguished Professor of English, French, & Comparative Literature at the CUNY Graduate Center in New York City.

Tausif Noor is a critic, curator, & PhD student in global modern art history at the University of California, Berkeley. His writing & essays have appeared in publications such as Artforum, the Poetry Project Newsletter, the New York Review of Books, & the New Yorker, as well as in various exhibition catalogues, artist books, & edited volumes. He lives in Oakland, CA.

Originally broadcast via Zoom on Monday, March 25, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis. Made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation. citylights.com/foundation

Wayne Koestenbaum with Tausif Noor

City Lights, ALTA Journal, & Heyday Books celebrate the publication of "The Forgetters: Stories" by Greg Sarris (Heyday Books).

Purchase books by Greg Sarris here: https://citylights.com/?search_type=author&s=Greg+Sarris

Celebrated storyteller & tribal leader Greg Sarris offers a contemplative & enchanting story cycle in "The Forgetters," a collection that blends into an unsuspected harmony shimmering with waking life, human & animal forms, & eras bygone & still-to-come. Borrowing from the cadence of Native American creation stories & the enchantment of magical realism, these tales combine to reveal the foibles & folly that beset us & the lessons that recall us to ourselves & the world.

"The Forgetters" excavates multilayered tales of California’s Indigenous exiles, camp workers, shapeshifters, & medicine people as they interweave with the paths of settlers, migrants, & other wayfarers across the arc of recent centuries & beyond. Narrated by the enigmatic crow sisters, Question Woman & Answer Woman, this collection returns to Sonoma Mountain & traverses the homelands of the Coast Miwok & Southern Pomo. Rooted in today’s Marin & Sonoma counties, these transporting tales glimmer with an intimate connection to place & past—from ancient mythic time when all the animals were people to a speculative future when the people return as environmental refugees to the mountain from which they came.

Greg Sarris is serving his sixteenth term as Chairman of the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria & his first term as board chair for the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian. His publications include "Keeping Slug Woman Alive" (1993), "Grand Avenue" (1994, reissued 2015), "Watermelon Nights" (1998, reissued 2021), "How a Mountain Was Made" (2017, published by Heyday), and "Becoming Story" (2022, published by Heyday). Greg lives & works in Sonoma County. Visit his website at: greg-sarris.com

Blaise Zerega is Alta Journal’s editorial director. His journalism has appeared in Conde Nast Portfolio (deputy editor & part of founding team), WIRED (managing editor), the New Yorker, Forbes, & other publications. Additionally, he was the editor of Red Herring magazine, once the bible of Silicon Valley.

Originally broadcast from City Lights' Poetry Room on Wednesday, April 24, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis. Made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation. citylights.com/foundation

Greg Sarris In Conversation with Blaise Zerega

Ana Raquel Minian in conversation with Irma Herrera discussing Minian's, "In the Shadow of Liberty: The Invisible History of Immigrant Detention in the United States," published by Viking.

Purchase here: https://citylights.com/new-nonfiction-in-hardcover/in-the-shadow-of-liberty-immigrant-det/

In 2018, many Americans watched in horror as children were torn from their parents at the US-Mexico border under Trump’s “family separation” policy. But as historian Ana Raquel Minian reveals in "In the Shadow of Liberty," this was only the latest chapter in a saga tracing back to the 1800s—one in which immigrants to the United States have been held without recourse to their constitutional rights. Braiding together the vivid stories of four migrants seeking to escape the turmoil of their homelands for the promise of America, "In the Shadow of Liberty" gives this history a human face, telling the dramatic story of a Central American asylum seeker, a Cuban exile, a European war bride, & a Chinese refugee.


As we travel alongside these indelible characters, "In the Shadow of Liberty" explores how sites of rightlessness have evolved, & what their existence has meant for our body politic. Though these “black sites” exist out of view for the average American, their reach extends into all of our lives: the explosive growth of the for-profit prison industry traces its origins to the immigrant detention system, as does the emergence of Guantanamo & the gradual unraveling of the right to bail & the presumption of innocence. Through these narratives, we see how the changing political climate surrounding immigration has played out in individual lives, & at what cost. But as these stories demonstrate, it doesn’t have to be like this, & a better way might be possible.

Ana Raquel Minian is a professor of history at Stanford University & the author of the award-winning book "Undocumented Lives," published by Harvard University Press in 2018. A recipient of the Andrew Carnegie fellowship, their writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, & Foreign Affairs, among other outlets. Originally from Mexico City, they now live with their partner in the Bay Area.

Irma Herrera is a writer, solo performer, & former lawyer based in the Bay Area. Her play "Why Would I Mispronounce My Own Name?" explores what it means to be American by weaving personal stories, humor, & historical events.

Originally broadcast from City Lights' Poetry Room on Thursday, April 18, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis. Made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation. citylights.com/foundation

Ana Raquel Minian in conversation with Irma Herrera

City Lights, Fern Books, Center for the Art of Translation, & Villa Albertine San Francisco celebrate the publication of "Like a Sky Inside" by Jakuta Alikavazovic – translated from the French by Daniel Levin Becker, published by Fern Books. 

Purchase here: https://citylights.com/european-literature/like-a-sky-inside/


In March 2020, a young woman spends the night in the Louvre. At home: her nine-month-old son. In her overnight bag: a notebook, a toiletry kit, a duvet, a cube of nougat, & something that shouldn’t be there. In her head: memories of the Venus de Milo, of land art & the American road, of romance & travel & immigration & war — & of her father, who after each of their many visits to the Louvre would ask just how she’d go about stealing the Mona Lisa.


Jakuta Alikavazovic is a French writer of Bosnian & Montenegrin origins. She has received the Prix Goncourt for a first novel & the Prix Médicis for non-fiction, among other European awards & nominations. She is a columnist for the newspaper Libération & the translator into French of authors including David Foster Wallace & Toni Morrison.


JiaJing Liu is a translator (English-Chinese-French), writer, & editor who lives in San Francisco. She studied translation at Université Aix-Marseille, & was a researcher at the Beijing bureau of Libération. Her writings have appeared in Popula, Civil, The Awl, LEAP, The Art Newspaper, & other publications. She recently served as assistant curator for the exhibition, Shifting Fields: Contemporary Chinese Painting, at the Stanford Art Gallery. She is the development manager at Heyday, an independent, nonprofit publisher in Berkeley, California.

Originally broadcast from City Lights' Poetry Room on Thursday, May 2, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis. Made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation. citylights.com/foundation

Jakuta Alikavazovic in conversation with JiaJing Liu

City Lights and Akashic Books celebrate the publication of "Joyce Carol Oates: Letters to a Biographer," edited by Greg Johnson, published by Akashic Books. 

Purchase here: https://citylights.com/new-nonfiction-in-hardcover/joyce-carol-oates-letters-to-a-biograp/

This rich compilation of Joyce Carol Oates’s letters across four decades displays her warmth and generosity, her droll and sometimes wicked sense of humor, her phenomenal energy, and most of all, her mastery of the lost art of letter writing. In this generous selection of Joyce Carol Oates’s letters to her biographer and friend Greg Johnson, readers will discover a never-before-seen dimension of her phenomenal talent.

Whereas her academic essays and book reviews are eloquent in a formal way, in these letters she is wholly relaxed, even when she is serious in her concerns. Like Johnson, she was always engaged in work, whether a long novel or a brief essay, and the letters give a fascinating glimpse into Oates’s writing practice.

Joyce Carol Oates is the celebrated author of a number of works of fiction, poetry, and nonfiction. She is the editor of "New Jersey Noir," "Prison Noir," and "Cutting Edge: New Stories of Mystery and Crime by Women Writers;" and a recipient of the National Book Award, the PEN America Lifetime Achievement Award, the National Humanities Medal, and a World Fantasy Award for Short Fiction. She lives in Princeton, New Jersey. "A Darker Shade of Noir: New Stories of Body Horror by Women Writers" is her latest work.

Steve Wasserman is the publisher of Heyday Books. He is a former editor-at-large for Yale University Press and editorial director of Times Books/Random House and publisher of Hill & Wang and The Noonday Press at Farrar, Straus and Giroux. A founder of the Los Angeles Institute for the Humanities at the University of Southern California, Wasserman was a principal architect of the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books during the nine years he served as editor of the Los Angeles Times Book Review (1996–2005). He has written for many publications, including "The Village Voice," "Threepenny Review," "The Nation," "The New Republic," "The American Conservative," "The Progressive," "Columbia Journalism Review," "Los Angeles Times," and the "(London) Times Literary Supplement."

Originally broadcast via Zoom on Thursday, March 18, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis. Made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation. citylights.com/foundation

Joyce Carol Oates in conversation with Steve Wasserman

City Lights and Melville House present Yanis Varoufakis in conversation with Peter Maravelis, discussing "Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism" by Yanis Varoufakis, published by Melville House.

Purchase here: https://citylights.com/topographies/technofeudalism/

Perhaps we were too distracted by the pandemic, or the endless financial crises, or the rise of TikTok. But under cover of them all, a new and more exploitative system has been taking hold. Insane sums of money that were supposed to re-float our economies after the crash of 2008 went to big tech instead. With it they funded the construction of their private cloud fiefdoms and privatized the internet.

Technofeudalism says Yanis Varoufakis, is the new power that is reshaping our lives and the world, and is the greatest current threat to the liberal individual, to our efforts to avert climate catastrophe—and to democracy itself. It also lies behind the new geopolitical tensions, especially the New Cold War between the United States and China.


Drawing on stories from Greek myth and pop culture, from Homer to Mad Men, Varoufakis explains this revolutionary transformation: how it enslaves our minds, how it rewrites the rules of global power, and, ultimately, what it will take overthrow it.

Yanis Varoufakis is an economist and academic, a bestselling author, and the former finance minister of Greece. He is a co-founder of the Democracy in Europe Movement 2025. His books include "And the Weak Suffer What They Must?," "Talking to My Daughter About the Economy," "Adults in the Room," and "Foundations of Economics."

Praise for "Technofeudalism:"

“Blending intellectual memoir, history, and economic and technological history, Varoufakis creates an intimate atmosphere that is a genuine pleasure to read … It’s hard to read this book and deny its power … illuminating.” — The Washington Post

“An outstanding economist and political analyst.” — Noam Chomsky

"Arresting … an ambitious thinker and a lively writer … Varoufakis is right that we are in thrall to digital platforms, who hold our data hostage and prevent us from switching to 'a competing cloud fief'" ― The Times (London)

Originally broadcast via Zoom on Tuesday, July 16, 2024. Made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation. https://citylights.com/foundation/

Yanis Varoufakis

Tarek El-Ariss in conversation with Peter Maravelis, celebrating the publication of "Water on Fire: A Memoir of War" by Tarek El-Ariss, published by Other Press.

Purchase here: https://citylights.com/middle-east/water-on-fire-memoir-of-war/

"Water on Fire" tells a story of immigration that starts in a Beirut devastated by the Lebanese Civil War (1975–90), continues with experiences of displacement in Europe and Africa, moves to northeastern American towns battered by lake-effect snow and economic woes, and ends in New York City on 9/11. A story of loss, but also of evolution, it models a kind of resilience inflected with humor, daring, and irreverence.

Alternating between his perspective as a child and an adult, Tarek El-Ariss explores how we live with trauma, poignantly illustrating the profound impact of war on our perception of the world, our fears and longings. His memoir is at once historical and universal, intellectual and introspective, the outcome of a long and painful process of excavation that reveals internal turmoil and the predicament of conflict and separation. A contemporary “interpretation of dreams” dealing with monsters, invisible creatures, skin outbreaks, and the sea, it is a book about objects and elements, like water and fire, and about how encountering these elements triggers associations, connecting present and past, time and space.


Tarek El-Ariss is the James Wright Professor and Chair of Middle Eastern Studies at Dartmouth College and was a Guggenheim Fellow (2021–22). Trained in philosophy, comparative literature, and visual and cultural studies at the American University of Beirut, the University of Rochester, and Cornell University, he is the author of "Trials of Arab Modernity: Literary Affects and the New Political" and "Leaks, Hacks, and Scandals: Arab Culture in the Digital Age," and editor of the MLA anthology "The Arab Renaissance: A Bilingual Anthology of the Nahda."

Originally broadcast via Zoom on Friday, May 17, 2024. Special thanks to Judith Gurewich. Made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation. citylights.com/foundation/

Tarek El-Ariss

City Lights celebrates the publication of "Blessings," a novel by Chukwuebuka Ibeh, published by Doubleday.

Purchase here: https://citylights.com/blessings/

Obiefuna has always been the black sheep of his family—sensitive where his father, Anozie, is pragmatic, a dancer where his brother, Ekene, is a natural athlete. But when Obiefuna’s father witnesses an intimate moment between his teenage son and another boy, his deepest fears are confirmed, and Obiefuna is banished to boarding school. As he navigates his new school’s strict hierarchy and unpredictable violence, Obiefuna both finds and hides who he truly is. Back home, his mother, Uzoamaka, must contend with the absence of her beloved son, her husband’s cryptic reasons for sending him away, and the hard truths that they’ve all been hiding from. As Nigeria teeters on the brink of criminalizing same-sex relationships, Obiefuna’s identity becomes more dangerous than ever before, and the life he wants drifts further out of reach. Set in post-military Nigeria and culminating in the Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Act of 2013, "Blessings" is an elegant and exquisitely moving story that asks how to live freely in a country that forbids one’s truest self, and what it takes for love to flourish despite it all.

Chukwuebuka Ibeh is a writer from Port Harcourt, Nigeria, born in 2000. His writing has appeared in McSweeney's, New England Review of Books and Lolwe, amongst others, and he is a staff writer at Brittle Paper. He was the runner-up for the 2021 J.F. Powers Prize for Fiction, was a finalist for the Gerald Kraak Award, and was profiled as one of the “Most Promising New Voices of Nigerian Fiction” by Electric Literature. He has studied creative writing under Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Dave Eggers, and Tash Aw, and is currently a an MFA student at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.

francesca ekwuyasi is a learner, artist, and storyteller born in Lagos, Nigeria. She was awarded the Writers Trust Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ2S+ Emerging Writers in 2022 for her debut novel, "Butter Honey Pig Bread" (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2020). "Butter Honey Pig Bread" was also shortlisted for a Lambda Literary Award, the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction, the Amazon Canada First Novel Award, and longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and the Dublin Literary Award. "Butter Honey Pig Bread" placed second on CBC’s "Canada Reads: Canada’s Annual Battle of the Books," where it was selected as one of five contenders in 2021 for “the one book that all of Canada should read.” francesca’s writing has appeared in the Malahat Review, Transition Magazine, Room Magazine, Brittle Paper, the Ex-Puritan, C-Magazine, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, Canadian Art, Chatelain and elsewhere. Her short story, "Ọrun is Heaven" was longlisted for the 2019 Journey Prize. She co-authored, "Curious Sounds: A Dialogue in Three Movements" (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2023), a multi-genre collaborative book with Roger Mooking.

Originally broadcast via Zoom on Thursday, July 11, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis. Made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation. citylights.com/foundation/

Chukwuebuka Ibeh in conversation with francesca ekwuyasi

Bushra Rehman in conversation with May-lee Chai, celebrating the publication of "Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion" by Bushra Rehman, published by Flatiron Books.

You can purchase copies of "Roses, in the Mouth of a Lion" directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/general-fiction/roses-in-the-mouth-of-a-lion-2/

Originally broadcast via Zoom on Tuesday, July 30, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis.

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation

Bushra Rehman in conversation with May-lee Chai

Daniel Borzutzky in conversation with Ricardo Alberto Maldonado, celebrating the publication of "The Murmuring Grief of the Americas" by Daniel Borzutzky, published by Coffee House Press

You can purchase copies of "The Murmuring Grief of the Americas" directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/murmuring-grief-of-the-americas/

Originally broadcast via Zoom on Wednesday, July 31, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis.

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation

Daniel Borzutzky in conversation with Ricardo Alberto Maldonado

Mosab Abu Toha reading from “Forest of Noise: Poems” by Mosab Abu Toha, published by Knopf Publishing Group

You can purchase copies of “Forest of Noise: Poems” directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/forest-of-noise-poems/ 

Originally broadcast via Zoom on Monday, November 4, 2024. Hosted by Peter Maravelis.

This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation

Find more recent events at our YouTube channel: CityLightsBooks

Mosab Abu Toha reading from "Forest of Noise: Poems"

Savannah Shange in conversation with Patrick Camangian discussing the subject of Savannah Shange's new book, Progressive Dystopia: Abolition, Antiblackness, and Schooling in San Francisco, published by Duke University Press.

In Progressive Dystopia, Savannah Shange explores the potential for reconciling the school's marginalization of Black students with its sincere pursuit of multiracial uplift and solidarity. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork and six years of experience teaching at the school, Shange outlines how the school fails its students and the community because it operates within a space predicated on antiblackness. Seeing San Francisco as a social laboratory for how Black communities survive the end of their worlds, Shange argues for abolition over either revolution or progressive reform as the needed path toward Black freedom.

Savannah Shange is Assistant Professor of Anthropology and principal faculty in Critical Race and Ethnic Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Patrick Camangian is an associate professor in the Teacher Education Department at the University of San Francisco. He has been an English teacher since 1999, beginning in the Los Angeles Unified School District where he was awarded "Most Inspirational Teacher" by former mayor Richard Riordan and the school's student body. Professor Camangian currently volunteers in the Oakland Unified School District teaching English. He has collaborated with groups such as California's People's Education Movement, the Education for Liberation national network, and San Francisco's Teachers 4 Social Justice.

LIVE! From City Lights

Savannah Shange

Eileen Myles reading from their new book, For Now, published by Yale University Press. 

In this raucous meditation, Eileen Myles offers an intimate glimpse into creativity's immediacy. With erudition and wit, Myles recounts their early years as an awakening writer; existential struggles with landlords; storied moments with neighbors, friends, and lovers; and the textures and identities of cities and the country that reveal the nature of writing as a presence in time.

Eileen Myles is an acclaimed poet and writer who has published over twenty works of fiction, poetry, nonfiction, and libretto. Their prizes and awards include a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Warhol/Creative Capital grant, an award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and a poetry award from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts

Eileen Myles

The official podcast for City Lights Publishers & Booksellers in San Francisco. Featuring readings and archives. Hosted by City Lights events coordinator Peter Maravelis.

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