People write for different reasons, but most people who write hope to be read. One of the strange things about writing in the non-blog world is that getting an audience requires participation in the big, strange world of the publishing industry. And even with a blog, although I see site stats and referrals on a daily basis, it’s tricky to know who came by in hope of porn and so soon left, and who read page after page until their life was changed.
This is one of the reasons, since coming to the States, that I’ve come to love public readings. People gather, and a poet, or story writer, or essayist stands up and reads aloud his or her work, and during those minutes, the writer can no longer complain about the foolishness of editors or agents, and the audience, hopefully, is no longer distracted by mobile phones and facebook. Everyone makes eye contact.
The other good thing about reading work aloud is that I can read it the way I’d like it to be read. I don’t do accents or voices when I read, but by pacing my sentences, I give the narration a personality.
As a result, I’m fond of starting and running reading series-es. The one I’m MCing on Saturday, at Bodhi Coffee, should be a good mix of planned readers and open mic-ers, a good mix of old writers and new. The scheduled readers are : Randall Brown, the director of the Rosemont College MFA, and Chris Bullard, a federal judge and published poet, as well as my friend and room mate, the short story and novel writer Matt Blasi. If you’re in the Philly area, come by. And I’m planning to make these readings at Bodhi a regular thing, so if you are a Philly/South Jersey based writer, drop me a line.
Daniel Wallace
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I would love to be able to read my poetry aloud, but I tremble at the thought of standing in front of an audience! Also, the fact that even posting my poems is so terribly scary to me, that people may think it is horrible, so to actually READ it and get immediate feedback to my face…well, you see my dilemma. Other than that…I live in a small town, and there is nothing available to me for such things. It is all politics and churches. (I live in the south lol) So, art in my community suffers. Any ideas on how to bring some creative life to my area? How to find locals who share my interests etc…and possibly form a club for readings and such?
Hey Kellie,
That’s a good question. I have two suggestions: one is that people like the idea of kids reading, and so it might be possible to organise a poetry event for local kids, ask local writers to get together and offer a poetry class for kids in a library–something like that.
Secondly, I think non-writing people get stressed at the idea of going to listen to someone they haven’t heard of, not knowing how good the person is going to be. And so I think it’s easier to get an audience, even a small one, if you plan to read or talk about a famous writer, like a local celebrity or Robert Frost. Then people maybe feel they’re going to learn something, and then later, once they know you, you can suggest everyone shares their own work. Like a band starting off performing other people’s covers.
(Do readers have other ideas?)
Daniel
PS I know the nervous feeling, and to be honest, I’ve done readings that I suspected haven’t gone very well. It happens, but then you try again with another piece, and slowly you get used to a crowd, and, also, your work improves.