On Wednesday, September 17th Jane Smiley presented a lecture and reading from her new novel, Some Luck, at Sweet Briar College in Amherst, Virginia. The novel is the first in a planned trilogy, The Last Hundred Years, about an Iowa farm family. Coincidentally, that same day the National Book Awards announced her one of the nominees for the fiction long list. Sweet Briar’s Memorial Chapel was filled with students, professors and a sprinkling of the general public. Behind the lectern, J.S., attractive and slender, in her sixties, with shoulder length blonde hair, was personable and … Continue reading Novelist Jane Smiley at Sweet Briar →
This coming Saturday Charlottesville’s WriterHouse will host its own special segment of an international event in which poets all over the world will be gathering in a spirit of global uplift. The Charlottesville segment will take place Saturday, September 27 at WriterHouse (see: Writerhouse.org) from 4:00 P.M. till 6:30. It’s free. I attended this event last year at WriterHouse and want to draw your attention to it. Polly Lazaron, organizer for the event, reports that this is the fifth of these events in which she has participated and the second for which she has been … Continue reading An International Celebration of Poetry Right Here In Charlottesville →
Lydia was larger than life. Her paintings, installations, lectures and scholarship were all intertwined, embodying her probing and profound intellect and her far ranging quest to decipher modern culture through the art of Pablo Picasso and other artists. Born into a Jewish family in Focsani, Romaniain 1926, Lydia Csato survived the German occupation of her country during World War II and went on to study art and the law at the University of Bucharest. By the 1950s, she was one of the most successful painters working in the Social Realist style mandated by Romania’s Communist … Continue reading Picasso, Lydia and Friends by Lyn Bolen Warren →
Like many other people, I have had Ferguson, Missouri on my mind in recent weeks. I have been thinking most directly, of course, about Michael Brown, his parents, family members, friends, all those who feel his loss in a very personal way. I have been thinking about other parents who have lost their children, and all those black parents who worry whenever their teenage sons are out in the world and vulnerable. I have been trying to take in the range of emotions that have been on display as people have taken to the streets … Continue reading Ferguson →
On August 7-10, I had the privilege of attending the Virginia Quarterly Review’s first writers’ conference, along with roughly 25-30 participants, at the Boar’s Head Inn right here in Charlottesville, VA. Three workshop leaders, poet Beth Ann Fennelly, Fiction writer Richard Bausch, and non-fiction/fiction writer Wells Tower each shone in their own way over the weekend; Beth Ann led a lively, ear-opening craft talk on sound (and a pretty great poetry workshop); Wells read from his GQ essay, “The Old Man at Burning Man,” sharing his experience of the event with his aging father; Richard … Continue reading VQR = GRT →
Streetlight Magazine is the non-profit home for unpublished fiction, poetry, essays, and art that inspires. Submit your work today!
