Kerry Folan - Chestertown Spy

Shore Lit October Notes and Musings by Kerry Folan

October 3, 2023 by Kerry Folan

In 2019, CJ Hauser’s Paris Review essay about calling off their wedding went about as viral as a literary essay can possibly go. Though Hauser had been primarily a fiction writer, the essay’s success resulted in a nonfiction book deal, and, happily, we now have the brilliant memoir-in-essays The Crane Wife.

I love and admire this collection. In many of the essays, Hauser deconstructs a familiar pop-culture text—Katherine Hepburn’s iconic film The Philadelphia Story, a William Carlos Williams poem, The Wizard of Oz—re-examining the myths about desire it offers. Frank and funny, the book is about love, and also, as New York Times columnist Jennifer Senior writes, “about the power of stories: The ones we are told versus the ones we tell ourselves; how they shape and misshape our expectations; how those stories can both affirm our instincts and estrange us from our deepest yearnings, sometimes at the same time.”

CJ and I will be discussing The Crane Wife—which was a Guardian “Best Book of the Year” and a Lambda Literary Award finalist—at the Academy Art Museum on October 13. Register via AAM’s website to save your seat!

What I’m Reading:

Stay True by Hua Hsu. Hsu, a loner at UC Berkeley, becomes unlikely friends with Ken, a gregarious frat boy who is also Asian American, and who is senselessly killed in a carjacking. Two decades later, the New Yorker staff writer reflects on the ways Ken’s friendship and death shaped Hsu’s own identity. This exquisite memoir was in my TBR pile for almost a year before I finally got to it. I wish it hadn’t taken me so long.

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson. Jackson wanted this to be “the kind of novel you really can’t read alone in a dark house at night.” While I’m usually a big baby when it comes to scary stories, I was intrigued by CJ Hauser’s essay about the book. When A Public Space announced it as their October APS Together read, I signed up—and am praying I don’t get nightmares.

Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann. My audiobook rec for the month is this 2017 best-seller, which recaps the horrifying murders of dozens of oil-rich Osage and the FBI’s hunt for their killer in 1920s Oklahoma. Grann’s book, which was a National Book Award finalist, and the much-hyped Martin Scorsese film adaptation coming out later this month have both been endorsed by the Osage community.

What Else I’m Looking Forward to on the Shore:

Film: “The Aunties” @ Mt. Pleasant Acres Farms, Preston

3:00-8:00 Saturday, October 14

Donation Based

The finale of the day-long We Will Be Elders Soulfest will be a screening of this short film documenting the preservation work and activism of farm owners Paulette Greene and Donna Dear.

Art Talk: Amy Boon McCreesh @ Academy Art Museum, Easton

11:00 Saturday October 21

Free

McCreesh will discuss her current exhibition, Visual Currency, which critiques luxury through exuberant mixed-media work.

Opera: Dead Man Walking @ Avalon Theater, Easton

1:00 Saturday October 21

$25 general, $23 senior, $17 student

Based on the memoir by Sister Helen Prejean, Dead Man Walking has become the most widely performed opera of the past several decades. The Met’s first-ever staging will be live-streamed at the Avalon as part of the “Live in HD” series.

Theater: Stage Fright II: 1964 @ Avalon Theater, Easton

Thursday October 26-Sunday October 28

$40 / $135 for the 10/28 “Director’s Cut” performance

Marguerite has been haunting the Avalon Theater since 1927, when she tragically fell down the elevator shaft. How does her story end? Featuring the music of Jenny & The Teen Spirit, this mid-century sequel picks up where we were left hanging last Halloween.

Shore Lit aims to enhance cultural offerings on the Eastern Shore with free community author events. This newsletter is written by Shore Lit Founder and Director Kerry Folan. If you see her walking her greyhound Pilot around town, stop and tell her what you’re reading!

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Shore Lit September Notes and Musings by Kerry Folan

September 4, 2023 by Kerry Folan

Since its release in June, Tania James’s novel Loot has been at the top of “must read” lists everywhere, from NPR to O, The Oprah Magazine to the New York Times. Though generally classified as historical fiction, the novel is also a coming-of-age tale and a love story:

Seventeen-year-old Abbas is conscripted to help build a life-sized mechanical tiger for Sultan Tipu. Though he leaves his family reluctantly, at the palace he finds both a mentor who hones his gifts as a woodcarver and the girl who will capture his heart. The novel is full of delight, adventure, and charm.

But Loot also challenges readers to consider colonialism’s bloody history and its current claims of ownership. Tippoo’s Tiger is an actual object in the permanent collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, made by an anonymous Indian artist during the 18th century and looted by British soldiers after the Siege of Seringapatam in 1799.

“I’d never seen a work of art—mechanized or otherwise—that was so bold in its contempt of British power, so irreverent and anti-colonialist,” Tania told me about the object that inspired her story.

Tippoo’s Tiger

It’s a rare book that can hold charm and subversion in equal tension, and I can’t wait to hear what else she has to say about this exceptional novel. Register here to attend the book talk at the Academy Art Museum on September 15!

What I’m Reading:

Maybe it’s the start of the fall semester that has me feeling decidedly group-discussion oriented. This month, I’m reading books I want to discuss in community:

There, There by Tommy Orange. This novel, which focuses on the interconnected lives of “urban Indians” in Oakland, California, earned a million awards when it came out in 2018, including a Pulitzer nomination. It’s the One Maryland, One Book selection this year, and it’s also this month’s Easton Book Group pick. All are welcome to join the conversation at TCFL’s Easton branch on 9/18.

The Floating Opera by John Barth. People tend to love or hate Barth, and this novel is no exception. It follows Todd Andrews, “the best lawyer on the Eastern Shore of Maryland and the most determinedly eccentric citizen of Cambridge,” on the day he decides to commit suicide. Local lit nerd Sam Van Nest is leading a discussion group on the novel at Chesapeake Forum this November.

True Biz by Sara Nović. Born deaf, fifteen-year-old Charlie never learned ASL. Now thrown into a boarding school for deaf teenagers and immersed in a vibrant and functional deaf world, Charlie grapples with her feelings of isolation from both the hearing and non-hearing communities. The novel was selected as a 2022 “Best Book of the Year” by NPR, the Washington Post, Publisher’s Weekly, and Book List. Join the Talbot Equity Diversity Inclusion Book Club for a discussion on 10/12.

What Else I’m Looking Forward to on the Shore this Month:

There’s an abundance of great local festivals this month, including the 31st Annual Native American Festival, Frederick Douglass Day, and the Chesapeake Film Festival, as well as the inaugural event in the Spy’s new Spy Nights reading series, featuring poet Sue Ellen Thompson. I’m also planning to check out the events below:

Theater: Much Ado About Nothing @ Adkins Arboretum, Ridgely

2:00 Saturday & Sunday, September 2 & 3

$10

Shore Shakespeare’s 2023 production brings the Bard’s wittiest rom-com to a plein air venue near you: In addition to the Arboretum dates, it will be playing at the Oxford Community Center 9/8-10 and Wilmer Park in Chestertown 9/15-17.

Film: Love & Friendship @ Norman James Theater, Washington College, Chestertown

7:00 Monday, September 18

Free

Whit Stillman, Academy Award–nominated screenwriter and beloved chronicler of the urban haute bourgeois, will be at Washington College’s Rose O’Neil Literary House as a visiting writer this month, offering a post-screening Q&A and a craft talk the following day.

Community Conversation: Read the Room @ Talbot County Free Library, Easton

5:30 Wednesday, September 20

Free

The Needle’s Eye Academy aims to create interdisciplinary literacy programming and empowerment for the Black and Brown youth of Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Co-founder Jaelon Moaney will lead a community-based discussion on the critical topic of access and equity of literary experiences on the Shore.

Book Talk: James McBride @ Cape Henlopen High School Theater, Lewes

1:00 Sunday, October 1

$28

Perennial award-winner James McBride—whose latest novel, Heaven and Earth Grocery Store, is one of the biggest books of the summer—will close out this year’s History Book Festival, a true gem of an event featuring 20+ author presentations in a range of genres. Tickets are required for McBride’s talk and include a copy of the book; the rest of the events are free.

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Q&A with Shore Lit Visiting Writer Tania James

September 2, 2023 by Kerry Folan

Tania James’s fourth book is a spellbinding coming-of-age tale. Abbas is just 17 when his gifts as a woodcarver come to the attention of Tipu Sultan and he is commanded to help build a life-sized mechanical tiger. But when it is stolen by British forces looting the palace, his fate becomes entwined with the wooden tiger he helped create, mirroring the vicissitudes of colonialism across countries, people, and decades. James chats with Academy Magazine about the novel, a “Most Anticipated Book of Summer 2023.”

Kerry Folan: The automaton in Loot is based on an actual mechanical tiger on view at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. How did you first come across this work of art, and when did you know you wanted to write about it?

Tania James: I can’t remember where I first came across the image of Tipu’s Tiger, but I do know that I found it captivating from the moment I saw it. For context, Tipu’s Tiger is a spectacular 18th century automaton composed of a six-foot long wooden tiger that’s mauling the throat of a prone English soldier. Back in the day, you could turn the hand-crank, and the tiger would grunt while the soldier groaned, all while organ music played from within. I’d never seen a work of art—mechanized or otherwise—that was so bold in its contempt of British power, so irreverent and anti-colonialist. So I knew I wanted to write about Tipu’s Tiger, but it took me a while to realize that the novel would focus more on the makers of the automaton than the automaton itself.

KF: This novel is epic, spanning wars, continents, decades. Of all the characters we meet in this saga, why did you decide to focus on Abbas’s perspective?

TJ: I originally thought Loot would be a heist novel that would take place in an English country house. I’d thought it would follow two people in their attempt to swindle a wealthy Englishwoman out of Tipu’s Tiger, which is part of her art collection. But a question that kept nagging at me was: what would motivate someone to want this object so badly that they’d be willing to risk their reputation, their life, their freedom for it? And so I kept coming back to the artist who made it. And as I was exploring that character, I traced his journey back to India, to the time when he was first assigned this task of constructing Tipu’s Tiger. And I discovered what it meant to him, to be apprenticed to a French clockmaker who believed in his gifts, and to find a sense of purpose through art.

KF: How did you land on the title Loot?

TJ: Early in my research I happened upon a thrilling discovery, that the word loot has Sanskritic roots. (Lutna means “to plunder.”) The word “loot” entered the English language somewhere around the time of the novel, when the British Empire was pivoting toward a more aggressive form of conquest. It was great to happen upon a single word that suggests theft and migration, not only of objects but of language itself.

KF: The novel engages difficult questions about colonialism, property, and stolen artifacts. Does it argue for a specific position on those issues?

TJ: Primarily I wanted to write a novel that was full of delight and adventure but that also posed the sorts of difficult questions that museums are facing right now, questions like: to whom does a prize of war really belong and how do we contend with its bloody history? In the novel, I don’t land on clear answers, as I’m most interested in following these characters on their difficult journeys, in finding humor amidst their hardship, and in trying to inhabit the wonder that accompanies an act of creation.

James will visit AAM on September 15 to discuss Loot, an NPR “Most Anticipated Book of Summer 2023,” with Shore Lit Founder Kerry Folan. Visit the AAM website to register for this free program.

Tania James is the author of four works of fiction, all published by Knopf: The Tusk That Did the Damage, which was a finalist for the International Dylan Thomas Prize and the Financial Times Oppenheimer Award; Aerogrammes and Other Stories, named a Best Book of 2012 by Kirkus Reviews, Library Journal, and The San Francisco Chronicle; and the novel Atlas of Unknowns, which was a New York Times Editor’s Choice and a finalist for the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature.

Kerry Folan is an Assistant Professor of writing and literature at George Mason University, and the founder of Shore Lit, an organization that brings free literary author events to the Eastern Shore.

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Shore Lit August Notes and Musings by Kerry Folan

August 3, 2023 by Kerry Folan

What a year it’s been! Since last summer, we’ve hosted 7 book talks, 3 book-club discussions, and 1 pop-up bookshop—all free and open to the public. We’ve met hundreds of new neighbors. We’ve stayed up late eating pizza and drinking beer with our visiting writers, many of whom had never been on the Shore, and all of whom told me how impressed they were with our incredible community.

I have spent this anniversary month feeling grateful to YOU: everyone who has come out to an event, donated funds to support our free programming, and partnered with us in one way or another to bring world-class writers to the Shore.

Shore Lit – Year 1 in Review from Caroline J. Phillips on Vimeo.

This anniversary video, created by Caroline J. Phillips with additional photography by Cecile Storm, summarizes what has been an exhilarating first year and, I think, captures why it’s so important to have access to literary programming right here in our community. I hope you enjoy it, and that we’ll see you at a book talk this fall. Here’s to year two!

What I’m Reading:

Sunburn by Laura Lippman. Lippman has written more than twenty crime novels over the past twenty years, nearly all of them set in Baltimore. (Her latest, Prom Mom, is one of the biggest books of summer.) Sunburn is a 2018 throwback set here on the Eastern Shore. Over the course of a sweltering summer, Polly, running from a bad marriage, and Adam, hired to find her, carry out a steamy affair that has all the ingredients of a perfectly indulgent beach read: betrayal, secrets, murder, etc. In Lippman’s hands, what should be fluff is smart, sexy, and always precise about place and culture.

Tom Lake by Ann Patchett. It almost doesn’t matter what Tom Lake is about; along with most of the rest of America, I’d read anything Ann Patchett writes. But for formality’s sake: her new novel tells the story of a summer theater troupe in 1980s rural Michigan and a contemporary family locked in place during the pandemic, both of which are perfect platforms for what she arguably does best—exploring the complicated dynamics of unconventional families.

The Country of the Blind by Andrew Leland. Back in his twenties, Andrew Leland was diagnosed with a degenerative disease that he was told would leave him blind by middle age. Now in his forties, he’s re-learning to navigate the world without sight, negotiating his changing relationship with his wife and son, and preparing for inevitable blindness. Andrew was my boss at The Believer magazine a million years ago and remains one of the people I most respect in the industry. His native warmth and intelligence translate onto the page as humor and curiosity, as he describes his efforts to embrace this new way of being. Check out an excerpt in The New Yorker.

What Else I’m Looking Forward to on the Shore this Month:

Art: Fall Exhibitions Opening Reception @ Academy Art Museum, Easton

5:30 Thursday, August 3

Free

AAM opens a trio of fall exhibitions this month: Amy Boone-McCreesh: Visual Currency, a mixed media commentary on luxury and access; Spatial Reckoning: Morandi, Picasso and Villon, which charts the ways the three artists use space and perspective as gateways to modern abstraction; and Laura Letinsky: No More Than It Should Be, still lifes by the Guggenheim-winning photographer. Letinsky, AAM’s 2023 Artist in Residence, will be on site to lead a gallery talk at 5:30.

Theater: Torch Song @ Dorchester Center for the Arts, Cambridge

August 11-20

$10-$20

In an essential response to the public dehumanization of “drag queens,” Groove Theatre Co. presents Harvey Fierstein’s Tony Award-winning play following a gay drag performer’s quest for the most human desires—love and family.

Film: With Peter Bradley @ Academy Art Museum, Easton

5:30 Thursday, August 17

Free

A preview event for the 2023 Chesapeake Film Festival, this documentary examines the life of abstract artist Peter Bradley. Following the film, Director Alex Rappoport will Zoom in for a Q&A.

Support Shore Lit’s Programs:

One of our core values is building inclusive community. For that reason, Shore Lit events are always free. To keep them that way, we are grateful to newsletter subscribers like you who help fund our programs. If you have the means and you value our mission of bringing literary authors to the Eastern Shore, please consider a $25 gift to support our programs. If you have more or less to offer, we are grateful for your generosity; no gift is too big or too small. If you aren’t in a position to offer monetary support, you remain a crucial part of this community, and we thank all of you for your consideration.

Kerry Folan is the founder and director of Shore Lit

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Shore Lit June Notes and Musings by Kerry Folan

June 3, 2023 by Kerry Folan

On Saturday June 17, the town of Easton will host the second annual Delmarva Pride Festival, and I’m thrilled to announce that Shore Lit will be participating with a Pride Pop-Up Bookshop celebrating queer stories for everyone.

We’re partnering with our friends at The Ivy, the cherished Baltimore bookstore, whose brilliant booksellers have put together a stellar collection of titles with queer and trans themes for you to browse and shop. There is truly something for everyone: romance, sci-fi, memoir, children’s, YA, poetry, literary fiction… you name it.

We’re especially excited that award-winning author and illustrator Elizabeth Lilly will be joining us in the afternoon to chat and sign books! Elizabeth’s work for children deals with the difficulty of understanding and loving yourself: Geraldine is about a lonely giraffe navigating life in a human school, while Let Me Fix You a Plate is about the food and love in her dual Colombian and American cultures. Elizabeth finds pride and joy in her identity as a lesbian, bi-racial, Colombian Latina, and she’s put together a curated capsule featuring some of her own favorite inspiring YA and picture books. Stop by and say hi!

What Else I’m Reading

Book-ban attempts aimed at LGBTQ+ content are soaring: seven out of the American Library Association’s top thirteen most challenged books feature queer stories. Shore Lit stands in defense of literary freedom with PEN America and the ALA, who remind us that banning books is “an attack on every person’s constitutionally protected right to freely choose what books to read and what ideas to explore.”

Free people read freely, y’all. So this month I’m making a point to read some of these frequently banned titles (descriptions pulled from the internet):

Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe. ALA Alex Award winner and Stonewall-Israel Fishman Non-fiction Award Honor Book. “Started as a way to explain to the author’s family what it means to be nonbinary and asexual, Gender Queer is more than a personal story: it is a useful and touching guide on gender identity–what it means and how to think about it–for advocates, friends, and humans everywhere.”

All Boys Aren’t Blue by George M. Johnson. New York Times bestseller. “In a series of personal essays, prominent journalist and LGBTQIA+ activist George M. Johnson explores their childhood, adolescence, and college years in New Jersey and Virginia.”

Flamer by Mike Curato. Lambda Literary Award for Children’s and Young Adult Literature. “It’s the summer between middle school and high school, and Aiden Navarro is away at camp. Everyone’s going through changes―but for Aiden, the stakes feel higher. Award-winning author and artist Mike Curato draws on his own experiences in his debut graphic novel.”

Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison. ALA Alex Award winner. “For Mike Muñoz, life has been a whole lot of waiting for something to happen. Not too many years out of high school and still doing menial work–and just fired from his latest gig as a lawn boy on a landscaping crew–he’s smart enough to know that he’s got to be the one to shake things up if he’s ever going to change his life.”

This Book Is Gay by Juno Dawson. Guardian Best Book of the Year. Garden State Teen Book Award Winner. “There’s a long-running joke that after ‘coming out’, a lesbian, gay guy, bisexual, or trans person should receive a membership card and instruction manual. This book is that instruction manual. This candid, funny, and uncensored exploration of sexuality and what it’s like to grow up LGBT also includes real stories from people across the gender and sexual spectrums.”

What Else I’m Looking Forward To on the Shore This Month:

Film: Sky Hopinka @ Academy Art Museum, Easton

6:00 Tuesday, June 6

Free

The Native filmmaker and MacArthur Genius will present several of his experimental shorts, followed by a Q&A with Salisbury University professor Dr. Ryan Conrath.

Theater: Alice in Wonderland @ Dorchester Center for the Arts, Cambridge

June 8–11

$15 adults; $10 students, Free for children under 5

Produced and performed entirely by local students, Groove Theater’s Student Lab production of Lewis Carrol’s classic is a family-friendly romp through Wonderland.

Lecture & Concert: Maryland Spirituals Initiative Gospel Concert @ The Avalon Theater, Easton

6:00 Saturday, June 17

$10

This unique Juneteenth celebration will feature artist Ruth Starr Rose’s illustrated collection of African American spirituals, which was lost for nearly a century and just recently rediscovered, with lectures from the Water’s Edge Museum scholars and a gospel choir performance.

Book Fair: Chesapeake Children’s Book Festival @ Talbot County Free Library, Easton

10:00-2:00 Saturday, June 24

Free

More than 20 children’s book authors and illustrators will be at the library to kick off the 2023 Summer Reading Program. The best part: any kiddo who signs up gets a voucher good for one free book from the attending author of their choice.

Shore Lit aims to enhance cultural offerings on the Eastern Shore with free community author events. This newsletter is written by Shore Lit Founder and Director Kerry Folan.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Shore Lit May Notes and Musings by Kerry Folan

May 6, 2023 by Kerry Folan

Maybe it’s because I made such a deliberate and dramatic personal change when I left I think a lot about what life in a rural community offers us that life in the city can’t. When I left New York, I hoped I would be trading quantity for quality. That has turned out to be true for me.

While I had access to so much in New York, I found, after a while, that I wasn’t really absorbing any of it. For me, the gift of living in a small town is time and attention. Both are more abundant here, and I can afford to be more generous with each than I ever could in the city. My life is richer as a result.

The same principle applies to Shore Lit. As a one-person organization, I will never be able to produce the number of events a great city bookstore does. But that was never the point. My hope in starting Shore Lit was to offer this community a way to connect through literature—to read excellent books we may not have otherwise discovered, and to discuss the ideas presented in those books with our neighbors in a setting that encourages curiosity. It’s about the conversations, as much as it’s about the content.

With that in mind, I’m experimenting with a new community conversation series this summer. Academy Art Museum Director Sarah Jesse and I will be leading a Summer Book Club in the AAM galleries—one book each month that coincides with the themes of an AAM exhibition.

These conversations will be intimate, 15 to 20 people tops (depending on the size of the gallery), giving participants the chance to connect with one another and to share their responses, interpretations, and questions about the work—both the art work on the walls, and the text we’re reading. Sarah and I will give some background on each, and we’ll offer some guided questions, but we won’t be lecturing. We imagine these as facilitated conversations, rather than formal talks. All are free (though registration is required for planning purposes), and books are available for purchase at AAM. I hope you’ll join us!

Visit the Shore Lit website for more information on each book selection and its corresponding exhibition.

What Else I’m Reading

To the Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf. I’ve joined A Public Space’s APS Together reading group, led by novelist Mona Simpson, to work through Virginia Woolf’s masterpiece this month. It’s like being back in school, in the best possible way.

River House, Sally Keith. An elegy for the speaker’s mother and a metaphor for the imperative of life after loss. I cried, and then I read these poems again start to finish.

How To Do Nothing, Jenny Odell. I finally got around to this buzzy 2020 book about “the attention economy.” I had been expecting something softer, more self-helpy, and was pleasantly surprised at the intellectual rigor and insight Odell brings to the topic.

Bonus: Use code BANNEDBOOKS10 to get 10% off orders at Bookshop.org all month long.

What Else I’m Looking Forward To on the Shore This Month:

Multicultural Festival @ Idlewild Park, Easton

10:00-2:00 Saturday, May 6 Free

A beloved family event returns with music, artisanal goods, and, of course, food: Haitian, Salvadoran, Indian, and Pakistani options will be available (plus hot dogs, sausages, snow cones, and ice cream).

Performance: Hoesy Corona’s Terrestrial Caravan @ Adkins Arboretum, Ridgley

1:00 Sunday, May 7 Free

Complementing his site-specific atrium installation currently on view at the Academy Art Museum, Corona will conduct a performance piece in which performers wearing his climate ponchos will walk the Arboretum grounds.

Theater: The National Theater’s King Lear @ The Avalon Theater, Easton

1:00 Saturday, May 13 $15

DC’s Shakespeare Theater just set the bar for modern adaptations of Lear with Simon Godwin’s record-breaking spring 2023 production. See how Ian McKellen’s performance compares in this replay from the London stage’s 2018 version.

Book Talk: David Sedaris @ Browseabout Books, Rehoboth Beach

6:00 Tuesday, May 30 $18.99 (includes a paperback copy of Happy-Go-Lucky)

If you missed everyone’s favorite Christmas elf at The Avalon last fall, you can catch him on the paperback tour for Happy-Go-Lucky. But the best part of a Sedaris event may very well be the signing line, where he chats and jokes with every last fan.

Easton-based Kerry Folan is an Assistant Professor at George Mason University. She is also the founder and director ofShore Lit, an organization that aims to bring literary events to the rural Eastern Shore of Maryland. Her creative nonfiction has appeared in the Baltimore Review, the Los Angeles Review of Books, the Washington Post, and other noted publications.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

What Is Eco-Poetry? Poet John A. Nieves Answers our Questions

April 15, 2023 by Kerry Folan

What exactly is “eco-poetry”? It’s a question that even the people writing in the genre debate. While some “eco” writers train their gaze strictly on the natural world, contemporary eco-poets are increasingly exploring writing that refuses to ignore human impact on the places we inhabit and visit. In anticipation of next Saturday’s Earth Day Eco-Poetry Event at the Talbot County Free Library, Salisbury-based poet and The Shore Poetry editor John A. Nieves explains the genre for us.

Kerry Folan: First, can you tell us a bit about The Shore Poetry journal? There are a lot of poetry journals out there. What does The Shore Poetry bring to the landscape that had been missing?

JN: We started the journal about five years ago because we wanted something that would press on the in-between-ness of contemporary poetry, to create a way to try to understand the way things interact when they’re never quite done with the reaction they’re having. We wanted to focus on places that are constantly being redefined, that never settle—and “the shore” seemed like the perfect expression of that, since it’s constantly building, receding, always in motion. All three of the founders also have a connection to the Eastern Shore, so that also made the shore-relatedness of the idea special for us.

KF: How do you pick the poems that appear in your journal?

JN: We received more than ten thousand submissions last year, from more than 50 countries and we only publish a small amount—50 poems per issue, publishing four issues a year. So it’s a very small percentage. My co-editors, Emma DePanise and Caroline Chavatel, and I read everything, and we only take things that we unanimously support.

KF: Though you’re based in Salisbury, you connect with writers and readers all over the world. Do you think that has to do with your mission of thinking about place in the liminal and transient way you describe?

JN: I think so. People everywhere understand that the world is always changing. Some writers are working in a domestic space where they may not have the freedoms of speech we have, and we platform a lot of that writing. Some writers are writing from literal warzones, others are just going about lives very different than those we often live in the US. We want those ideas of living to have voice and to blend and bend and react with one another.

KF: How does place—and perhaps also the idea that place is transient—relate to what we call “eco-poetry”?

JN: The way I’ve been thinking about that lately is that eco-poetry is poetry of the environment, but the environment is place—and the way people interact with place is important to eco-poetry. Also important is the way we understand place and its value. Sometimes that’s an environmental value, but sometimes it’s much more than that. There’s an emotional investment in a plant, right? Not just the hope for its health. We can’t just understand the science of place, we also have to understand the emotional investment, because without the emotions, the science will never matter.

KF: How would you define the difference between eco-poetry and environmental poetry?

JN: Environmental poetry is fundamentally concerned with the environment and its survival, which is really important. But eco-poetry, I think, takes that a step further and tries to understand a specific place, and the way the environment interacts with it. We are part of the environment. Eco-poetry doesn’t try to hide that. Even the artificial things that we put together and that can damage so much of the world are now part of that environment, whether we like it or not. Eco-poetry deals with that fact and what it means for a given place. We are parts of a system. Eco-poetry acknowledges that system-ness.

KF: The Shore Poetry has curated an eco-poetry Earth Day reading at the Talbot County Free Library. Can you tell us a little about some of the poets you and the other Shore editors selected to participate in this reading?

We thought it was really important for the work that would be read to interact with this area, so we asked people who are close to the Eastern Shore and know this environment. We have some incredible poets coming: Catherine Pierce, Jane Satterfield, Ned Balbo, Lindsey Lusby, Christine Spillson. And we also have a bunch of new and upcoming poets who are really getting their work out in the world, like Sarah Brockhaus, Summer Smith, Siobhan Jean-Charles, Shannon Ryan. So there’s going to be a lot of energy! We’ll be seeing the gradient of poetry from the very new to the established, all very much alive and engaging with the Earth Day themes.

Join the Talbot County Free Library, Shore Lit, and The Shore Poetry for a special eco-poetry reading on Earth Day, Saturday, April 22, in celebration of National Poetry Month. Fifteen poets with personal ties to the Eastern Shore will read original poems related to the themes of place, liminality, and human interaction with the environment. The event is free and open to the public. Light refreshments will follow the reading, giving attendees a chance to engage with the poets and editors and speak to them about their work. Reservations are not required.

Easton-based Kerry Folan is an Assistant Professor at George Mason University. She is also the founder and director of Shore Lit, an organization that aims to bring literary events to the rural Eastern Shore of Maryland. Her creative nonfiction has appeared in the Baltimore Review, the Los Angeles Review of Books, the Washington Post, and other noted publications.

John A. Nieves is a poet, teacher and scholar. He is Associate Professor of English at Salisbury University in Maryland and recipient of the 2020 Distinguished Faculty Award. He is one of the co-editors of The Shore Poetry. He received his PhD from the University of Missouri and his MA from the University of South Florida. His poems have appeared in many national journals and have won numerous awards. His first book, Curio, won the 13th Annual Elixir Press Poetry Awards Judge’s Prize.

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Shore Lit April Notes and Musings by Kerry Folan

April 2, 2023 by Kerry Folan

What I’m Up To:

I came late to poetry. Though I was always a hungry reader, the poetry I was exposed to in school was old and, it seemed to me then, boring. I didn’t get it. It wasn’t until I was in graduate school for creative writing, when I was suddenly surrounded by young writers talking seriously about craft and constantly swapping their favorite poems, that I began to really read it. I’ve come to love poetry’s mix of playfulness and precision. It’s still the genre I have to work hardest at, but it’s now as essential to my reading life as prose.

So this year, in celebration of National Poetry Month, I’m particularly excited to be partnering with the Talbot County Free Library and The Shore Poetry journal to present a special eco-poetry event. We’re bringing together fifteen fantastic poets—all previous contributors to The Shore Poetry—on Earth Day to share work that engages with the theme of place and our human impact on it. The program includes Lindsay Lusby, Jane Satterfield, Ned Balbo, Christine Spillson, Sarah Brockhaus, Chris Cocca, Catherine Pierce, Summer Smith, Siobhan Jean-Charles, Cassandra Whitaker, Shannon Ryan, Gary Fox, Nancy Mitchell, Tara A. Elliott, and Terin Weinberg.

Even if you don’t think you’re a “poetry person” (maybe especially if you don’t think you’re a poetry person), I hope you’ll join us for this fun, casual event from 2:00-4:00 on Saturday, April 22. Come as you are, stay for one poem or the whole show, and check out some of the most exciting contemporary poetry being created in our region.

What Else I’m Reading

What Lies in the Woods, Kate Alice Marshall. Murder mysteries are my guilty pleasure, though I try to avoid the more lurid “dead girl” narratives and to look for writers who pay as much attention to language as they do plot and character. Kate Alice Marshall checks all my boxes.

When We Were Sisters, Fatimah Ashgar. What happens to ordinary orphans, the ones without superpowers? the protagonist asks. This lyric novel describes life in the margins for three Muslim-American siblings. I’ll be at the TEDI bookclub discussion coming up on April 13, and hope to see some of you there!

Above Ground: Poems, Clint Smith. The author of the required reading How the Word Is Passed—2021’s nonfiction exploration of the ways African American history is preserved and erased—has a new book of poems that grapple with hope, disappointment, and endurance.

Breaking Form podcast, James Allen Hall & Aaron Smith. Described to me by Dr. Hall as a “dirty, gay poetry podcast,” this clever, raunchy, and hilarious show is all I want to listen to recently. The hosts make a point to say that they’re “not for everybody,” but I’d recommend them to anyone who wants to see what poetry looks like out of the classroom, in the hot and messy real world.

What Else I’m Looking Forward To on the Shore This Month:

LaToya Hobbs: Woodcuts opening at AAM on April 22

Kent County Poetry Festival:

1:00 Saturday, April 1: Local Celebrity Poets with James Allen Hall @ The Raimond Center

7:00 Saturday, April 1: Patricia Spears Jones in conversation with Maureen Corrigan @ Norman James Theater, Washington College

2:00-5:00 Sunday, April 2: Open-Mic Poetry @ Robert Ortiz Studio

A full weekend of free poetry events in Chestertown. (I’m trying to get up the nerve to read at the open mic.)

Film: The Quiet Girl @ Cinema Art Theater, Lewes

6:00 Wednesday, April 5

$9.00 RBFS Members, $11.50 General, $5.00 Student

This gorgeous adaptation of Claire Keegan’s novella Foster got an Oscar nom for Best International Feature. It’s been hard to find on the Shore, but the Rehoboth Beach Film Society is screening it this month.

Lecture: “Friends ‘til the End: Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell” @ TCFL, Easton

6:00 Thursday, April 13 – Free

Local poet and Pulitzer-prize nominee Sue Ellen Thompson will discuss the very close friendship between two of the 20th century’s greatest poets.

Exhibition Opening: In Praise of Shadows & LaToya Hobbs: Woodcuts @ Academy Art Museum, Easton

10:00-4:00 Saturday, April 22- fFree

Two excellent-looking new shows are opening at AAM this month: In Praise of Shadows presents works on paper by big-name artists like Dox Thrash and Louise Nevelson, and LaToya Hobbs: Woodcuts features large-scale woodcuts by the Baltimore-based artist, who will offer a lecture on her process and influences at the opening.

Support Shore Lit’s Programs:

Easton-based Kerry Folan is an Assistant Professor at George Mason University. She is also the founder and director of Shore Lit, an organization that aims to bring literary events to the rural Eastern Shore of Maryland. Her creative nonfiction has appeared in the Baltimore Review, the Los Angeles Review of Books, the Washington Post, and other noted publications.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Shore Lit March Notes and Musings by Kerry Folan

February 28, 2023 by Kerry Folan

I discovered Lawrence Weschler in 2006 while interning at McSweeney’s, the indie house that had just published his award-winning essay collection Everything that Rises: A Book of Convergences. In it, he explores images, forms, and compositions found in life that seem also to repeat throughout art history: Rothko’s 1969 black and white colorblocks mirroring newspaper covers from that year’s moon landing; Joel Meyerowitz’s photograph of a 9/11 first responder echoing Valezquez’s rendering of the god of war. Art, imitating life, imitating art.

The interns at McSweeney’s are not paid, or they weren’t then, but they are invited on their last day to help themselves to a few books from the office stock, which is how I came to own that volume (which is, sadly, now out of print). I flipped through it, fascinated, and then put it on my bookshelf for a decade. It wasn’t until grad school that I truly got to know his writing, when a professor assigned his seminal essay “Vermeer in Bosnia.” In it, he draws connections between the Vermeer paintings he observed hanging in the Mauritshuis Museum and the Yugoslav war-crimes tribunal he was covering nearby in The Hague. He concludes, startlingly and convincingly, that these apparently incomparable things are in fact remarkably similar: they are both about finding interior peace in the face of ravaging violence.

This is, I now know, Weschler’s specialty: pairing seemingly unrelated things to revelatory effect. I was stunned by the power of his insights as well as the openness of his prose. In refreshing contrast to the tight-fisted academic exegeses I was used to, Weschler’s essays are rangy conversations, brilliant and accessible, illuminating and human-scaled. I had found my new favorite essayist.

Of course, I’m not alone there. Lawrence Weschler is a legend. He was a staff writer at the New Yorker for more than twenty years, twice winning the George Polk Award for reporting, and the author of more books than I can name. His work has won the National Book Critics Circle Award and been shortlisted for the Pulitzer, and in forty-plus years of trying to make sense of the comedies and tragedies of this world through his writing, he has yet to slow down. His new biweekly substack, Wondercabinet, is fantastic, and he continues to write books, articles, and exhibition catalogues at a dizzying pace. (His article on the record-breaking Vermeer exhibition at the Rijks Museum in Amsterdam is due out this week or next in the Atlantic.)

So imagine my surprise to find an email from him in my inbox a few months ago. He had, apparently, stumbled across an essay about his work I had written some years ago for the Los Angeles Review of Books and reached out to introduce himself. It was like getting a letter from Santa Clause, or the President. Elated, I asked him if he would consider coming to Easton as a Shore Lit visiting writer, and—I can still hardly believe this—he said yes.

A huge thank you to the Academy Art Museum and George Mason University for making this program possible. Seeing Lawrence Weschler speak about his work in person is a bucket-list moment for me, and I am beyond thrilled that it is happening here, on the Shore. He’ll be lecturing at 6:00, Friday, March 3 at AAM; I hope you are all able to join us for what’s sure to be an incredible evening.

Reserve Your Seat

What Else I’m Reading this Month:

Night of the Living Rez, Morgan Talty. Set on a Penobscot reservation in Maine, this story collection has been racking up award noms. Talty combines gritty materiality with humor, offering an irreverent Indigenous narrative that rejects sentimentality—even as it examines the complexities of addiction, poverty, and intergenerational trauma.

This Time Tomorrow, Emma Straub. Reliably, Straub hits that sweet spot between clever and warm-hearted. In this novel, 40-year-old Alice time travels back in time to her 16-year-old life and is given the chance to change the trajectory of her father’s future.

Still Pictures, Janet Malcolm. The legendary journalist looks back at her own life through a series of snapshots, which function more as metaphor than documentary. Though spare, Malcolm’s memoir is relentlessly elegant. To wit: “The events of our lives are like photographic negatives. The few that make it into the developing solution and become photographs are what we call our memoirs.”

What Else I’m Looking Forward to on the Shore this Month:

Film: Women Talking @ Regal Cinema, Salisbury
March 4-9, various showtimes
$12-$18
Sarah Polley stacked her film adaptation of Miriam Toews’s novel with serious heavy hitters: Rooney Mara, Frances McDormand, Claire Foy, Jessie Buckley. Skipping the Shore entirely in its original release, it’s playing on just a few dates this month in the run-up to the Oscars.Reading & Workshop: Meredith Davies Hadaway, Sophie-Kerr Poet-in-Residence, Rose O’Neill Literary House, Washington College, Chestertown
5:30 Tuesday, March 7
FreeMeredith Davies Hadaway has published three collections of poetry, including At the Narrows, winner of the Delmarva Book Prize, as well as essays and reviews for anthologies and journals. She’ll read from her work, and then lead a generative writing workshop.

Music: Mid-Atlantic Symphony Orchestra March Concert, Easton Church of God, Easton
7:30 Thursday, March 9
$50
Elizabeth Song, winner of the Elizabeth Loker Concerto Competition, will be the featured soloist for performances of Johannes Brahms’s Tragic Overture and Florence Price’s Symphony No. 1 in E Minor.

Exhibition Opening: “State of the Art” and “Bill Wolf Sculpture,” Dorchester Center for the Arts, Cambridge
5:00-7:00 Saturday, March 11
Free
Dorchester Center for the Arts presents the exhibit State of the Art in partnership with the University of Maryland Global
Campus and the American Poetry Museum. Bill Wolf: Sculpture will be on display in the upstairs performance hall. The Sagacious Traveler will be performing at the opening reception, part of Cambridge’s Second Saturday arts celebration.

Theater: Fun Home @ Black Box Theater, Salisbury
Thursday, March 9-Sunday, March 12
$20 general public (discounts for students, seniors, faculty)
Adapted from Alison Bechdel’s extraordinary graphic memoir of the same name, this Tony Award-winning musical charts young Bechdel’s relationship with her closeted homosexual father, who runs a funeral parlor out of the family’s home.

Exhibition: Fractured Modernities: Contemporary Turkish Art @ Academy Art Museum, Easton
On view through April 16
Free
Turkish-born curator Mehves Lelic has selected four contemporary artists whose work collectively demonstrates the exhaustion and joy of living and making art under authoritarian rule.

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Shore Lit Notes and Musings by Kerry Folan

February 4, 2023 by Kerry Folan

Next week, for our first event of the spring season, Jung Yun will be in town to discuss her fantastic novel O Beautiful. I couldn’t be looking forward to this book talk more.

This was one of my favorite reads of 2022 for a couple reasons, including the protagonist, who is unlike any fictional heroine I’ve met. A quick synopsis: Now in her forties, newly minted journalist Elinor Hanson returns home to North Dakota to write about the impact of the oil boom on the small towns there. Elinor is complex—both tough and vulnerable, ambitious and self-destructive, like many women I know in real life, and I can’t wait to talk to Jung about how she managed to craft such a realistic and compelling heroine.

I also love the way this novel refuses to make villains out of ordinary people, or to take sides in the complicated arguments over ownership and belonging the oil boom exacerbated in small towns suddenly overrun with itinerant workers. Race, class, gender, and violence are considered thoughtfully and with empathy, broadening the conversation, rather than shutting it down. For more pre-game prep, click through to my interview with Jung in the Talbot Spy. And don’t forget to reserve your seat! Sign up here for a special evening.

What Else I’m Reading this Month

The Vanishing Half, Brit Bennett. This elegant novel is about twins, identity, racial passing, and choices you can’t take back. Trying desperately to finish in time for the TEDI bookclub meeting at the library on Thursday, Feb. 2!

The Crane Wife, CJ Hauser. The title essay (which went viral back in 2019) examines the ending of a love story through the lens of the famous folk tale. This brainy, poignant collection expands beautifully on that premise.

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Gabrielle Zevin. 2022’s most celebrated novel lives up to the hype. Come for themes of friendship, collaboration, and creativity, delightfully explored; stay for the ‘90s video game nostalgia. Bonus: The audiobook narrator is terrific.

What Else I’m Looking Forward to on the Shore this Month

Art Opening: Clarity @ The Foundry, Denton
3:00-5:00 Friday, Feb 3
Free

Artist Rose Jeon contemplates the importance of self expression in more than 50 artworks created during their three-month residency at the Foundry.

Lecture: Bear Me Into Freedom with Jeffrey C. McGuiness @ Talbot Historical Society, Easton
1:00 Wednesday, Feb. 1
Free for THS members; $5 non-members

The photographer discusses his project documenting/re-imagining the landscape of Frederick Douglass’s Talbot County.

Theater: Tred Avon Players present Time Stands Still @ Oxford Community Center, Oxford
February 16-26
$25 general admission; $15 students

This contemporary drama, which revolves around a photojournalist injured in the Iraq war and her reporter boyfriend, won Laura Linney a Tony nod back in 2010.

Artist Talk: Cheryl Warrick @ Academy Art Museum, Easton
5:30 Saturday Feb. 18

Known for organic forms and abstract maximalism, the artist will discuss the work currently on view in AAM’s Abstract Surge exhibition.

Film: African American Film Festival @ Cinema Art Theater, Lewes
Feb 17-19
$10 per film general admission; $5 for students

Back after a COVID hiatus, the AAFF screens feature-length and short documentaries spotlighting African American culture. Of note: A Most Beautiful Thing, about the first African American high school rowing team in the country, and a local news segment on black watermen of the Chesapeake.

Easton-based Kerry Folan is an Assistant Professor at George Mason University. She is also the founder and director of Shore Lit, an organization that aims to bring literary events to the rural Eastern Shore of Maryland. Her creative nonfiction has appeared in the Baltimore Review, the Los Angeles Review of Books, the Washington Post, and other noted publications.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

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