A Note from the Director In This Issue: 1

A Note from the Director
In This Issue:
What I love most about the shorter, darker days of December
leading up to the new year is that we naturally tend toward remembrance and reflection. We celebrate what has brought us
joy, and mourn what we may have lost.
We’d Like You to Meet:
Laurie Mansell Reich.................. 2
Speak Easy: Words Without
Walls Benefit Party..................... 3
Chatham @ AWP......................... 4
Field Seminar: Vietnam.............. 5
Inspired by Vietnam.................... 6
Field Seminar: Israel................... 7
Independent Literary
Publishing Book Launch............. 8
Summer Residency.................... 9
Meet Mel Fox/A Change in the
Lineup....................................... 10
An Evening with Loren,
McNaugher, and St. Germain....11
Maria Mazziotti Gillan & Gerard
LaFemina Reading................... 12
The Fourth River Release Party.13
InterRelated.............................. 14
Salgado Maranhão & Alexis
Levitin Reading......................... 15
We’ve much to celebrate this year, as you’ll see from our bursting-at-the-seams newsletter: A great celebration of alums at the
AWP reception earlier this year; a successful fundraising party
for Words Without Walls, thanks to Pittsburgh Party for a Purpose and MFA volunteers; exciting trips to Vietnam and Israel; new student, faculty and
alum publications and awards, another dynamic MFA summer residency, another even
more vibrant Word Circus, and another year of a rich reading series that stretches from
Pittsburgh to Brazil and back.
Other highlights: Another successful year of working in the Allegheny County Jail with
Words Without Walls (thank you Sarah Shotland and Jessica Kinnison and all the volunteer
teachers!) has come to an end. A generous gift of $10,000 from Fred and Melanie Brown
will assist us with operating funds for the next few years. We’ve also expanded the WWW
program to include Sojourner House, a half-way house for mothers with children. Sarah
Shotland and I will pilot a new creative writing course designed for these women in January.
You may have seen the new, extremely awesome video Chatham created to highlight the
program, which is now also posted on Facebook.
We have also had some losses this year: Peter Oresick remains on medical leave, though
he is healing quite nicely. We miss you, Peter! Debbie Juran has also left us, but we do get
to see her still on campus. We’re very happy to now have Libba Hockley (MFA 2010) as
our full time program assistant.
A search is on to hire a new Associate Director, who will begin August 1, and we have some
excellent candidates already. We hope to report a new hire for you soon.
Lan Samantha Chang............... 17
I’ve gone on too long but I haven’t gotten through half of my list of things we have to celebrate. I can’t close without thanking all of you for your great spirit—alums, faculty and
students. You are what make this program such a gift: the bounty of your spirit and talent
and drive are the only visions I need this holiday season dancing in my head.
There’s Something Happening
in Braddock............................... 18
Autumn House Reading /
Earth INK.................................. 16
Happy Holidays,
Sheryl St. Germain
Word Circus.............................. 19
1
We’d like you to meet:
Laurie Mansell Reich
by Gina Olszowski
T
here are many things that make Chatham University’s MFA program so special: its devoted
teachers, its supportive community of students, its field
seminars that enrich and provoke. But there’s one important ingredient we mustn’t overlook — the care and support of alums who believe in what we’re doing. Alums
like Laurie.
Laurie Mansell Reich graduated from Chatham’s MFA
program in 2001, with a dual concentration in poetry and
nonfiction. She speaks fondly of some of her favorite
teachers when I meet her for coffee at a Panera outside
the city. It is a blustery afternoon, Valentine’s Day, and
she gives me a heart-shaped sugar cookie with sprinkles when she returns to our table with her drink.
“Sandy Sterner was a wonderful teacher,” Laurie recalls. “When I graduated, she made me an afghan.
I have German Shepherds, and so she knitted it with
black, brown, and tan yarns so it would match my
dogs. I still use it every day.”
Laurie has found numerous ways of returning the
generosity that she came to treasure from her time
at Chatham, though she asserts that it’s her husband’s hard work and big heart that makes it all possible. In 2005, she and her husband Henry founded
the Laurie Mansell Reich Poetry Prize through the
Academy of American Poets. This prize is awarded
each year to an exceptional student poet. “I love to
read the entries,” Laurie says. “They’ve been getting
progressively better each year, but in the last two
years in particular, they’ve been outstanding. Very
hard to choose.” Many names that are well-known
today earned their recognition through an Academy of American Poets College Prize, including
Sylvia
Plath,
Mark Doty, and Toi
Derricotte. The prize
also comes with
a chance to have
one’s poem selected for the Academy’s annual
anthology. “I wanted to encourage future students
to write poetry, and to write poetry well,” Laurie says.
Additionally, Laurie and Henry have brought writers
to campus as well as helped to sponsor Chatham’s
first Bridges to Other Worlds literary festival. Laurie
explains that when she was a student, she was encouraged by her teachers to attend literary festivals
to saturate herself in all that the literary world had to
offer. At one such festival, at which she had her husband Henry, a lawyer, in tow, she had the opportunity
to see what a difference such experiences truly make.
“That first year, he brought his laptop and blackberry
with him,” Laurie explains. “And he said, ‘Okay, I’ll
go. But I’m going to sit in the back of the room and
do work.’ But then after awhile, he started listening to
the readings and loving it. He began listening to poetry tapes during his drive to and from work. And the
next year, he had his own festival schedule planned
out with which lecturers he wanted to hear, and which
workshops he wanted to attend.” Since the first Bridges
festival in 2008, Chatham has hosted three others, offering students the chance to interact with writers like Phillip
Lopate and Dinty W. Moore.
Laurie lives outside Pittsburgh where she runs a freelance copyediting service and continues to write.
2
Speak Easy:
A prohibition-era party &
poetry slam benefitting
Words Without Walls
W
ords Without Walls, Chatham University’s creative writing outreach program
at the Allegheny County Jail, has enjoyed tremendous success and support since its
birth two years ago. This spring, Words Without
Walls received an additional outpouring when it was
chosen to be the beneficiary of Pittsburgh’s Party for
a Purpose. PPP chooses worthy local organizations
to champion with its quarterly fundraising parties,
and Words Without Walls was honored to receive
their selection.
The theme of the party, “Speak Easy” drew students, faculty, alums, and members of the greater
writing community to the Brillobox, decked out in
their swankiest 1920s garb. Entertainment included
a poetry slam by Tim Seibles, Toi Derricotte, Heather McNaugher, and Sheryl St. Germain. Music by
DJ Thermos, DJ Soulstrings, and the rebel hiphop duo SolSis, kept crowds dancing until the wee
hours of the morning. A photobooth stocked with
plenty of prohibition-era props helped to document
the festivities.
Gina Olszowski
3
Chatham@AWP
by Gina Olszowski
E
E
very year, Chatham MFA students are
encouraged to attend AWP’s Annual
Conference & Bookfair. It’s a jam-packed
weekend full of readings and panels on
everything from how to cultivate a writing
life after your MFA, to a consideration of
how the prairie landscape of the American Heartland lends itself to gothic fiction.
There is truly something for everyone, the
budding student writer in particular.
This year, the conference was held in
Chicago. Despite the distance, Chatham’s
representation was as strong as ever. On
registration day, groups of students greeted
each other excitedly across the crowded
lobby, hugging and comparing schedules.
And on Friday evening, Chatham hosted a
reception with hors d’oeuvres and readings by recent alums.
At the bookfair, hundreds of publishers
and literary magazines meet and greet
conference-goers, selling—and often giving away—reading material of all kinds. It’s
a wonderful opportunity for Chatham students to check out new literary magazines
they might be interested in subscribing
or submitting to, and to network with fellow writers and publishers from across the
country. By Sunday afternoon, students
can be seen limping along with shopping
bags crammed full of journals and professional contacts.
Students involved in The Fourth River,
Chatham’s literary journal, also have the
opportunity to work a table at the bookfair.
There, they sell issues of the magazine
and answer questions to visitors who
are interested in the program. It’s always
exciting to meet prospective students, to
reunite with alums, and to get to meet past
contributors face-to-face. If you’ll be at this
year’s AWP conference in Boston, be sure
to stop by our table and say hello!
Clockwise from Bottom Left: Students Malini Ramadorai and Leah Brennan enjoy the festivities; Issue 8’s Managing Editor
Caroline Tanski and Designer Gina Olszowski man the table at the book fair; Sarah Shotland gives a reading at the
reception party hosted by Chatham; Author and contributor to The Fourth River, Faith Adiele, chats with Peter Oresick; Marla
Druzgal has her book signed by Margaret Atwood; Students from Knee-Jerk Magazine showing off their swapped copy of
The Fourth River; Laura Davis reads her poetry at Chatham’s reception party.
4
Field Seminar:
Vietnam
T
he first afternoon in Vietnam, I fall in love with the motorbikes. We begin in Ho
Chi Minh City, old Saigon, where the air is as thick with people as it is humidity.
It has just finished raining—the “lucky rain,” they tell us, the first of the rainy season—and
bikes dodge each other and us, lacing tire tracks over the damp, steaming streets. I make it
a project to write observations from my big bus window of the types of motorbikes and various objects being transported by them. An oscillating fan with a stand. Neon sign. Tripod flower
arrangement. Wicker high chairs strapped to bikes, babies seated inside. Two giant birdcages, bigger
than a man’s torso, one covered in silk. Six people. A potted palm tree (these men give me the peace
sign when they see me smiling). A man with a bike fringed, parade-float style, with bulging plastic bags of green
vegetables. He smiles at me. I wave. He waves back.
I need to be on a motorbike. It’s unsatisfying to observe from a behemoth bus, and it’s conspicuous to walk our big
American bodies through the sidewalks. The way to be part of the place here is to join the sea of bikes. There are few
street signs, almost no traffic lights, and what appear to be no strict rules. Yet somehow, in a captivating dance that has
become second-nature to the motorists, they drive six-wide, as many deep, bunch up at intersections mere inches from
one another, stretch out on straightaways, and navigate roundabouts without any problems. They are like water slipping
over stone. They are wabi-sabi. I want to be in the thick of them. I want to experience Vietnam from the Vietnamese
perspective. Which is to say, on two wheels. Thronged.
Sarah Leavens
Top Right: Students take a break from helping the farmers.
Below: Riding bikes in Hoi An, Vietnam.
At Left: With students in the classroom (photos by Sarah Leavens).
5
Inspired by
Vietnam
Clockwise from top: MFA Students meet
with local children (photo by the American
center); Learning to cook Vietnamese
food (Sarah Leavens); The group (Janice
Anderson); Jessica Server at the weaving
village (Sarah Leavens).
Excerpt from “Openings” by Ian Riggins
A
s we traveled around Ho Chi Minh City—and later around Hoi An, Da Nang, Hue and Hanoi—I noticed that the
Vietnamese don’t seem to hide much from the weather. Even their buildings embrace it. I started to recognize
an important characteristic of Vietnamese architecture: openness. Almost every home has some sort of
balcony or outdoor mezzanine. The apartment buildings are tall and narrow and fitted with huge
windows and doors that can be thrown wide to let in the breeze. There are hardly any
storefronts—many shops open directly onto the streets, their front walls nonexistent.
Cafés and rest stops are often made up of little more than roofs with supports
at the corners. People sit on small plastic stools out on the sidewalk, or recline in hammocks beneath trees at roadside “hammock cafés.” Even the
Reunification Palace in Ho Chi Minh City, with its stuffy 1960s décor,
features high ceilings and walls made up almost entirely of windows,
which rotate outward and give the impression of being outside. Everywhere, indoor and outdoor spaces are combined. The elements
aren’t shut out and controlled, as we so often try to do in America.
Instead they are welcomed, accepted. And why not? No one can
change the weather.
6
Field Seminar:
Israel
Excerpt from “Another Kind of Blues”
T
he longer I stayed in Israel the more I understood why the man at the bread stand gave me the Arabic phrase for getting
one’s attention not the one for excuse me.
Bumping into people and finding words for sorry was the least of their worries.
“People worry about feeding their kids, eh, if they will make enough money,
we live off tips you know. But it’s nice. Yeah. Our own bus, meals, always a
place to sleep. Me. Me? I don’t know, eh, I don’t worry about it so much,”
our bus driver Itai scrunches his face and waves a no flatly across the air,
“I don’t worry. It’s like this: eh, tomorrow… is tomorrow, and everything
good in Jerusalem,” he smiles, waving a no for finished into the air. Feeling
satisfied we walked back to our bus, his bus, we are still overwhelmed this
early in the trip, carrying readied pencils in our sunburn-peeled fingers.
Daeja Baker
“Jordan rests on the east side of the Dead Sea
and is visible from where I stand.
Caroline Horwitz
Its dusty mountains and beaches look, from here, just like Israel’s.
We only have an hour here in the sea before we have to leave. I’m told I wouldn’t want to stay in the water
any longer than that; that stewing in so much salt for a long period of time would pickle me. But
it’s so peaceful and the water more inviting than I could have imagined. I’d like to stay on
my back in this mystifying place that seems to defy physics. Close my eyes and take
a nap, as if in an inflatable lounge chair, except there would be nothing between
me and the water. Perhaps I could sleep and drift all the way to Jordan…”
7
From left to right: Photos by Caroline
Horwitz and Daeja Baker.
Independent Literary Publishing
T
Book Launch
he students of Independent Literary Publishing held their
Annual Chapbook Launch in the Welker Room of the
Laughlin Music Hall on Chatham University’s Shadyside Campus
in April, displaying 16 limited edition chapbooks of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, graphic novel, and other genres.
Each student learned not only what made a successful publishing
company, but went through every step of the process, from acquiring content to editing the manuscript, marketing the product, and
finally working with a local bookmaker to make the limited edition
chapbooks each student and author envisioned.
Some authors of note include Jorie Graham, a celebrated poet,
whose chapbook This: A Selection of Jorie Graham’s Poetry,
1997 - 2012 was published by Julia Heifet’s company, Peach Tree
Press, and Jan Beatty, whose poetry chapbook Ravage was published by Amy Lee Heinlen and Marguerite Sargent’s press, Leftie
Blondie Press. Hidden Door Press, from publishers Emily Cerrone
and Leni Wiltsie, created The Thing with Feathers, an anthology
of works from Words Without Walls authors. Jean Hopkins published Words Without Walls graduate and 2012 Pen Prison Award
winner Eric Boyd’s chapbook, Whiskey Sour, with Nervous Puppy
Publishing.
Chapbooks and cash were swapped along with smiles and goodies such as wine, whiskey, chocolate, and fruit while authors like
D’arcy Fallon, Isreal Centeno, and Chatham’s own Kathy Ayres
read excerpts from their works. Many chapbooks sold out well
before the evening concluded.
Jean Hopkins
JONATHAN
Auxier
New faculty Jonathan Auxier is a screenwriter and novelist from Vancouver, Canada.
Over the last decade, he has worked in a variety of storytelling mediums -- including film,
television, theater, fiction, and comic books. His debut children’s novel, Peter Nimble and
his Fantastic Eyes, was published by Abrams last fall. He holds an MFA in Dramatic Writing from Carnegie Mellon University and has a special interest in classical story structure
and the golden age of children’s literature. He now lives in Regent Square with his wife,
daughter, and their adorable pet umbrella.
8
Summer Residency
of Chatham’s Low-Residency MFA Program
From left to right: At Eden Hall Farm (Betsy Butler); The
Low-Res Group (Aimee Walton).
T
here we were, face-to-face at last, glasses of wine in
uncertain hands. (Whose brilliant idea was that?) We
low-res. MFA students greeted each other on the first night of
our Pittsburgh residency. For some of us, the first year nerves
birthed butterflies in our stomachs as we connected flesh and
blood people to tiny snapshots from Moodle in our minds. And
so it began: ten days of intense workshops, insightful lectures,
entertaining readings, fascinating fieldtrips, and a whole lot of
late nights.
Professors Sherrie Flick, Jim Coppoc, and Lori Jakiela
gave lectures on setting, mixed genres, and truth. Our
featured writer, Scott Russell Sanders, and program
director, Sheryl St. Germain, also shared their knowledge
on thoughtful essays and risky writing. Meanwhile, we students filled pages with scribbled notes as we sipped coffee or Mountain Dew or energy drinks to enhance our
endurance for the coming days. In workshops, we shakily read our pieces aloud or subjected our precious writing to critique, and we found community and support,
a pleasant surprise. Ten revisions later (or was it fifty?),
deeper, more polished work emerged where early drafts had
been.
During our few free evenings, we experience Pittsburgh through
Frank Lloyd Wright’s architectural genius, Fallingwater. We also
visited Eden Hall Farm where sunflowers fuzzy as lion’s manes
searched for the sky and the garden’s bounty filled our plates for
lunch. Scott Russell Sanders even took the time to hike with us
and share his wisdom of the natural world. His detailed knowledge of the leaves, birds, and mushrooms filled our imaginations,
and he encouraged us to use all of our senses, not just sight, in
our own writing. Several of us visited the Words Without Walls
program too. We took part in the inmates’ writing exercises, and
they impacted us with their willingness to learn, their talent and
potential.
Weeks after we returned, those thumbnail images popped up on
Moodle again. This time, we exclaimed, “It’s good to ‘see’ you
again!” and “Remember that one day…?” We had become a livelier bunch, a community of growing writers.
Aimee Walton
9
Meet: Mel Fox
Melanie Dylan Fox has lived in almost every region of the U.S., from
the forests of the Pacific Northwest to the deserts of the Southwest to
the mountains of California’s Sequoia National Park, a place that first
inspired her journey into nonfiction writing. Her work has appeared
in various literary journals and has been included in the anthologies
American Nature Writing; Figuring Animals: Essays on Animal Images in Art, Literature, Philosophy, & Popular Culture; Between Song and Story: Essays for the Twenty-First Century; and
Permanent Vacation: Twenty Writers on Work and Life In Our
National Parks. Her work has also earned her notable mention
in Best American Essays and an AWP Intro Award. Trained as a
fiction writer, she now writes narrative nonfiction which focuses on
the intricacies of place and landscape, with a particular interest in
the portrayal of animals in science, folklore, and myth. A Chatham
faculty member since 2005, she has taught courses in creative nonfiction, nature writing, travel writing, ecofeminist literature, and she
has been involved with thesis projects in all genres. She currently
makes her home at the confluence of the Blue Ridge and Appalachian Mountains in the New River Valley of southwestern Virginia.
Acting Director of the LowResidency MFA Program
Goodbye Debbie
!
A
s the MFA Program’s cherished assistant, Debbie Juran, begins her new
chapter within a different area of the university, we welcome Libba Hockley back to the hallowed halls of Lindsay House.
Says Debbie, “I loved being a part of the planning of all the wonderful events
along with Sheryl and the other faculty. I will always have fond memories of the
faculty and students in the MFA Creative Writing Program, and I know there
will always be exciting news to hear about
the success of our students--past and
present!”
A Change in
the Lineup
Hello Libba!
As for Libba, she graduated from Chatham University in 2010 with an MFA in
creative writing. She spent the last two years working for Words Without Walls,
and for a local nonprofit promoting computer literacy. Some of her literary
work can be found in Shady Side Review, Coal Hill Review and The Fourth
River. She is excited and honored to join the Chatham community once again.
10
An Evening with BK Loren,
Heather McNaugher, and Sheryl St. Germain
by Dakota Garilli
O
ne of the great things about our MFA program is the year-long reading series that allows students to interact with well-known
authors. We sometimes forget that we have well-known authors on the faculty that we get to see every day. On the evening
of September 7th in the Welker Room, visiting writer BK Loren, and two of our faculty, Sheryl St.
Germain, and Heather McNaugher, read from their three recently published books, Theft
(Loren); Navigating Disaster: Sixteen Essays of Love and a Poem of Despair (St.
Germain), and System of Hideouts (McNaugher). The event was a celebration
and book launch for the three writers. Although BK Loren is visiting, she will
be our keynote writer for the Summer Community of Writers in August 2013.
Whether discussing moments shared with her father, past lovers, a falcon,
and even herself, McNaugher’s poems pulled the audience close to her experience and built a bond of honesty and intimacy. She wove in comments
on her writing and current life, as well, rounding out the images she presented.
St. Germain deftly picked up where McNaugher left off, inviting readers into her
private world of New Orleans and taking us on a journey through the swamps of the
area surrounding her home city, as well as the land of glaciers (in Alaska.) She commented
on her desire to bring students close to her own experience in order to better teach them, a theme
that resounded in the excerpts that she chose to read.
Clockwise from the left: She
ryl St. Germain; BK
Loren; Heather McNaugher
11
Of the three works read, it seemed at first that Loren’s Theft might give
us the least intimacy with its author (mostly because it’s a work of fiction.)
However, as Loren began to inform the audience of her experience in building the characters and narrative of her novel, a bridge was built. The peak
of her intimacy with the group came when she admitted that she included a
note from her own mother in the text of Theft. The audience could hear two
voices in the reading of the note – that of a character in a novel, and the imagined voice of Loren’s mother in a moment before her passing. In this case,
Loren maximized on the moments in between reading sections of her work to
develop a connection to the audience.
The experience one has when hearing an author read a piece the way they
meant it to be read is one that cannot be easily paralleled. It creates a sense of
intimacy between writer and audience and, if done right, often creates an unforgettable experience. These authors—each in their own way—invited the audience into the depths of their private worlds, fostering an iron connection between
writer and reader.
authors
After the reading, attendees noshed on cookies, crackers and cheese, and the
authors signed copies of their new books.
Maria Mazziotti Gillan & Gerard LaFemina
At left: LaFemina & Gillan sign books; At right: Students peruse the available books.
O
n the evening of October 4th, 2012, Maria Mazziotti Gillan
and Gerard LaFemina joined students, alums, teachers and
guests in the Welker Room for a showcase of their selected works.
Poems by Gillan, recipient of the 2008 American Book Award and
Director of the Creative Writing Program at Binghamton University-SUNY, and LaFemina, recipient of a Pushcart Prize and Director of the Frostburg Center for Creative Writing at Frostburg State
University, were digested over snacks, lemonade, and tea.
LaFemina’s poems, musical, funny, and unguardedly sobering,
acquainted the audience with the off-beat beauty lurking just below the surface of the everyday. Gerry’s reading, spanning love
found with “The Record Store Cat,” (“so fickle & self-determined,/
so utterly untamed even in domesticity”) and the memory of love
lost when he is reacquainted with a strung-out ex, was humorously punctuated with juicy, meditative verses on fruit. (Yes, fruit.)
Gillan, meanwhile, moved listeners to tears with poems about the
shame she felt as a young girl with a working-class father; about
her son, distant physically and emotionally; about the oil-spill grief
of watching her husband die. Her deeply contemplative tales of
growing up and growing old as an Italian-American were frank and
touching, and rounded off a night of diverse, tantalizing poetry.
12
The Fourth River Release Party
Dakota Garilli, The Fourth River Fellow
S
tudents, faculty, and honored guests gathered in the Welker Room at 7:30 pm on
September 14th for the launch party of The Fourth River Issue 9. The evening
began with praise for Peter Oresick, Caroline Tanski, and the other staff members who
worked on this issue in 2011-12.
Attendees were treated to readings by poet Robert Gibb and a host of Chatham alumni:
Robert Isenberg, Lo Williams, and Eric Boyd (who graduated from Chatham’s Words
Without Walls program). In addition to readings from The Fourth River contributors,
practicum students Marla Anzalone and Marguerite Sargent gave spirited readings of
work by Michele Morano and Jan Beatty.
The general consensus was that the evening was a great success—the perfect way to
celebrate Issue 9 and get the community excited for what’s to come from The Fourth
River.
13
Clockwise from the top: Lo Williams; Robert Isenberg entertains the crowd; Eric
Boyd; Marla Anzalone, Robert Gibb
InterRelated
| on the 50th Anniversary of Silent Spring
One artist’s response to Rachel Carson
Kate Cheney Chappell, herself a noteworthy Chatham alum (and co-founder of Tom’s of Maine), has for a long time been inspired by
Rachel Carson’s timely mission and life-long dedication. The result of her personal interactions with Silent Spring tell a mixed-media
story of a susceptible and morphing environment, the amalgamation of nature and man-made refuse, and the hopeful glimmer of
regeneration. With a nod to Carson’s timeless literary contributions, Chappell also arranged a poetry reading to commemorate
the opening of her art installation. Together, Chappell and Chatham University welcomed to campus Jean LeBlanc, professor at
Sussex County Community College and author of At Any Moment, and Marjorie Agosin, award-winning poet, essayist, fiction writer,
activist, and professor of Spanish language and Latin American literature at Wellesly College. Together, they shared poems that
concern the very human, like baseball, to the universal: history, nature, and what will be left for future generations when we’re gone.
At left: Invited poets Jean LeBlanc and Marjorie Agosin with the artist Kate Cheney Chappell (in middle).
R
achel Carson, writer, scientist, and ecologist, grew up simply in
the rural river town of Springdale, Pennsylvania. Her mother bequeathed to her a life-long love of nature and the living world that Rachel
expressed first as a writer and later as a student of marine biology. Carson
graduated from Pennsylvania College for Women (now Chatham University) in 1929, studied at the Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboratory, and
received her MA in zoology from Johns Hopkins University in 1932.
Silent Spring alerted a large audience to the environmental and human dangers of indiscriminate use of pesticides, spurring revolutionary changes in the laws affecting our air, land, and water. “Silent
Spring became a runaway bestseller, with international reverberations . . . [It is] well crafted, fearless and succinct . . . Even if she
had not inspired a generation of activists, Carson would prevail as
one of the greatest nature writers in American letters” (Peter Matthiessen, for Time’s 100 Most Influential People of the Century).
14
Salgado Maranhao & Alexis Levitin
O
by Kinsley Stocum & Leah Brennan
n Thursday, October 18th, Salgado Maranhão and Alexis Levitin
joined Chatham writers for an intimate reading in the Mellon Living
Room. Maranhão, an award winning Brazilian poet, and Levitin, renowned
translator of Portuguese and Brazilian literature, met in 2007 at Brown
University. With nine previous collections of poetry, Maranhão is one of
Brazil’s most beloved writers. An accomplished musician, he has also written lyrics for some of Brazil’s most successful artists, a role that reflects
Maranhão’s attention to music and sound. His partnership with Levitin led
to a bilingual edition of Maranhão’s most recent collection of poetry, Blood
of the Sun (Sol Sangüíne) published this fall by Milkweed Editions.
Maranhão and Levitin were joined by students and faculty before the reading for dinner and discussion, enthusiastically answering all queries put
forth -- from the origins of Maranhão’s unique style, to the challenges and
considerations broached when translating poetry. Afterward, Maranhão
and Levitin showcased selected poems from the new collection. During
this reading, Maranhão first performed in the original Portuguese, followed
by Levitin with his English translation. They wanted the audience to hear
the music of the pieces in their native tongue, the assonance impossible to
replicate in English translations. This dual approach to reading gave Maranhão’s beautiful, surreal poems an extra layer of complexity. Maranhão’s
poems convey the harsh landscape of his birthplace, the northeastern region of Brazil. Introduced to poetry by his mother, a supporter of Brazil’s
traveling troubadours and poets, Maranhão writes of community, landscape, and often of poetry itself.
Levitin interspersed his readings with explanations of word choices, discussions on the challenges of musicality vs. meaning, and humble apologies
for mistakes in the text (which he offered to fix in our books). In his translator’s note at the end of Blood of the Sun, Levitin describes how he and
Maranhão worked together to capture, as closely as possible, the sound of
Maranhão’s Portuguese in English. Sound, Levitin writes, is “the deepest
truth in language,” and Maranhão agrees. Together, they treated the audience to an evening of poetry, “the giddiness of language,” “ravenous/ roar
of the word.”
At the conclusion of the formal presentation, Maranhão and Levitin fielded
questions from the audience, enjoyed light refreshments, and signed copies of Blood of the Sun.
Top: Maranhao and Levitin share the sound
of the rattlesnake. Middle: Levitin signs copies
of Blood of the Sun. Bottom: Students join
Maranhao for pizza and discussion.
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Autumn House Reading
O
n November 2nd, the Chatham MFA in Creative Writing program, in conjunction
with Autumn House Press, welcomed Brian Brodeur, Sharma Shields, and Ruth L.
Schwartz to the Welker Room for a reading from their latest books. Brodeur, recipient of
the 2012 Autumn House Poetry Prize and current Elliston Fellow in Poetry at University
of Cincinnati, started the night with work from Natural Causes. His poems were democratic in their subject matter, from revealing the oddity and fragility of the everyday to
diving into the profound sorrow of losing a loved one to a far-away war.
Sharma Shields, winner of the 2012 Autumn House Fiction Prize, read from her collection of stories Favorite Monster. Her fiction was light and often rewarded with hearty
laughs from the crowd--how else would you expect a story about a cyclops working at a
PR firm to be received? Her deft blending of trope with reality set up a unique environment for her characters to interact and self-reflect, revealing deeper insights beneath the
comical surface.
Schwartz closed the reading with selections from Miraculum, her 5th book of poetry.
Through opening her poems with meditations on nature, like observing a lily on a coffee
table, Schwartz seamlessly led the audience into universal connections to the larger
world, her painful family history, and personal relationships. Her final, distinct voice
rounded out a rewarding night of writers both talented and diverse.
Top: Brian Brodeur. Middle: Sharma Shields. Bottom:
Ruth L. Schwartz.
Earth
, INK
Earth, INK is an after-school nature-writing program run by Chatham
MFA students at the nearby Frick Environmental Charter School as
well as in Braddock. Once a week, MFA students visit the schools
and lead engaging nature-writing activities for the children. During
the fall semester, activities were curated around the theme of light,
and children were taken outdoors to observe nature and freewrite,
taught to interact curiously with their environment, and encourgaed
to be passionate about writing. The spring semester will be an exciting time for change, focusing on the theme of metamorphosis. MFA
students will also be working on encapsulating their lesson plans into
workshops that can be held throughout the Pittsburgh community,
like the Phipps Conservatory and the Pittsburgh cityLab.
Right: Ian Riggins teaches the kids about haiku.
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2012 Melanie Brown Lecturer
by Rachael Levitt & Kinsley Stocum
Lan Samantha Chang
O
n Wednesday, November 14th, at 8 p.m. in the Welker Room of the James Laughlin Music Hall, the Chatham University MFA in
Creative Writing program welcomed Lan Samantha Chang, 2012 Melanie Brown Lecturer.
Lan Samantha Chang is an author who transports her readers across the world and back, from China to the Midwest. Straddling
cultures and continents, her prose wrestles with assimilation and generation gaps. Her stories and characters move the reader and
deepen our empathy, while her elegant prose slips into our minds and settles there, resonating.
Ms. Chang’s accomplishments are considerable and well deserved; her short story collection, Hunger, was a finalist for a Los Angeles
Times Book Award and the winner of the Southern Review Fiction Prize. She has written two novels: All Is Forgotten, Nothing Is Lost
and Inheritance. Inheritance won the PEN/Beyond Margins Prize for the Novel. Ms. Chang is the recipient of varied respected fellowships, among them a Bunting Fellowship from Harvard University, a Hodder Fellowship from Princeton, and both NEA and Guggenheim Fellowships. She has taught fiction writing at Stanford, Harvard, and Warren Wilson, and currently lives in Iowa City where she
teaches at and directs the renowned Iowa Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa. She is the first Asian American director, as well
as the first female director of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop.
Because of her distinguished status, she is often questioned on the necessity of an MFA degree. In an interview with Salon, Ms. Chang
addressed the real importance of pursing an MFA: “I think when you go to an MFA program, it gives you a different orientation toward
time, generally. You have more time to think, and you have time to think about your life. And to think about the lives of other human
beings. That is a privilege, but it is something that a lot of people need and want. It’s a privilege and a basic human need. Our society
pushes us toward productivity in a way that is antithetical to our basic needs. In an MFA program, you have time to think and to pursue
something that you love.”
Below left: Rachael Levitt introduces Lan Samantha Chang. Below right: Ms. Chang reads from her newest book, All Is Forgotten, Nothing Is Lost.
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There’s something happening in
Braddock
S
ome might call it a revival. But in the small,
once-bustling town outside of greater Pittsburgh, where the booming steel industry both rose
and fell, something is definitely happening. At the
UnSmoke Systems Artspace, for example, two
writer-in-residence programs are now offered for
emerging and continuing writers, so they might
flourish and interact with the burgeoning local art
scene. In fact, one of Chatham’s faculty, Sherrie
Flick, was crucial in the creation of the Into the Furnace writing residency program. And you might
recognize the current Out of the Forge Writer-inResidence—recent alum, Sarah Leavens (2012).
Sarah Leavens received her MFA in Poetry and
Nonfiction and earned certificates in the Pedagogy of Creative Writing and Travel Writing. She
also served as the Margaret Whitford Fellow. Her
recent work has been published in the Pittsburgh
Post-Gazette and the Diverse Arts Press and is
forthcoming in Weave Magazine, So to Speak,
and Blast Furnace; she also teaches writing and
visual art at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts.
On October 6th, 2012, community members were
welcomed into the UnSmoke Artspace for the 4th
annual Wood-Fired Words, a BYOB event that features the current writers-in-residence, a constant
supply of creative and freshly-made pizzas, and
a pop-up used bookstore. Sarah was introduced
by Chatham’s own Marc Nieson, an instrumental
community member who has his writing studio in
the UnSmoke space. Together with Sean Thomas
Dougherty, Braddock’s 2013 Into the Furnace
Writer-in-Residence and Salvatore Pane, author
of the forthcoming novel Last Call in the City of
Bridges, published by Braddock Avenue Books,
Sarah regaled the audience with poems and prose
focused on love, food, and family. In many ways,
these were fitting themes for the night.
Top: Marc Nieson. Middle Sarah Leavens. Bottom: Sherrie Flick.
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Luke See
Jenny Ashburn
Tony Ciotoli
Word Circus
Word Circus, the free monthly reading series put on by the Chatham MFA Creative Writing Program, is a great opportunity for students to share their work
and socialize in an enthusiastic environment. Hosted at the Most Wanted Fine
Arts Gallery on Penn Avenue in Garfield, each month showcases four MFA candidates as readers and welcomes all students, as
well as community members, to bring work to contribute during the open mic. The September Word Circus celebrated the return
of students to campus and welcomed all the new writers to the MFA program. Featured readers included Luke See, Marla Anzalone, Sarah Grodzinski, and Tony Ciotoli. The Halloween Word Circus, featuring Jenny Ashburn, Dakota Garilli, Valerie Lute, and
Heather Price, was a ghoulish good time as readers and audience members alike dressed up in their finest Halloween costumes
and noshed on complimentary snacks. The Winter Word Circus, the last of the semester, kicked off the holiday season with ugly
sweaters and fantastic readings by Eli McCormick, Anya Rhode, Laura Drumm and Leah Brennan.
Dakota Garilli
Jessica Kinnison
Valerie Lute
Heather Price
Emcee Ian Riggins
Maryann Ullmann
Emcee Luke See
Ian Riggins
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Marla Anzalone
Rob Farrell
Leah Brennan
Upcoming Events
at Chatham!
February 15th, 2013
12:00 PM - 9:00 PM
Bridges to Other Worlds Festival
This year’s Bridges to Other Worlds Festival focuses on
publishing.
March 22nd, 2013
7:00 PM - 9:00 PM
Autumn House Fiction Reading
Fiction writer Steve Schwartz reads work.
Alum News
D. Gilson, MFA class of 2012, has released his
first chapbook, Catch & Release (winner of the
2011 Robin Becker Prize). It can be ordered
online from sevenkitchens.blogspot.com.
Ernestina Fraser, MFA class of 2009, released her
first memoir, Carnival of Love, on November 30,
2012. It is published by Caribbean Studies Press in
Coconut Grove, FL, and can be purchased from their
online catalogue at www.caribbeanstudiespress.com.
May 19th, 2013
6:30 PM - 8:30 PM
MFA Final Reading for Graduates
MFA Graduates read from final manuscripts to
celebrate the culmination of their degree.
Laura Davis, MFA class of 2011, released her debut
chapbook, Braiding the Storm, through Finishing Line
Press, in 2012, Order your copy at
www.finishinglinepress.com.
Voice CATCH will meet every Saturday!
Starting on Saturday, January 12, 2013, members
of Words Without Walls (WWW) will hold our
Community Writing Workshop: VoiceCATCH
(Voice Creation AT Chatham) every week from
10 AM to 12 PM in Lindsay House at Chatham
University.
Jessica Server’s first chapbook, Sever the Braid, was
selected as a semi-finalist for the Finishing Line Press
New Women’s Voices Contest and is slated to be
published in 2013.
Parting Words
A
from Kinsley Stocum, Rachel Carson Fellow
t the end of my first semester in the Chatham MFA Creative Writing Program, and in the spirit of the holiday season, I remember how grateful I am to be in this wonderful community of writers. As the current Rachel Carson
Fellow, I have had the great opportunity to attend and document the many happenings of our program. Getting involved
has always been, and will always be, my foolproof method of feeling at home; I’ve made fantastic friends, met acclaimed
poets and authors, and found peers that can meet my needs as a creative mind. And I’m already looking forward to the
coming year! The Bridges to Other Worlds Festival returns to campus in February, and we’re welcoming a diverse group
of panelists to discuss the festival’s theme, publishing. I’m also gearing up for my first AWP Conference, to be held this
year in Boston. On that note, I greatly encourage you to find a way to become more involved within our MFA program; attend an upcoming reading, join the group at Voice CATCH one Saturday morning, or simply spend time with other writers
in the program. You never know what to expect, but I promise you won’t be disappointed.
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