The first and only odd thing that happened at Tuesday night’s “How Not to Run A Reading Series” panel discussion at the KGB bar was when moderator Andrew Lloyd-Jones, in his opening remarks, said he’d rather be at one of the other Brooklyn Book Festival Bookend events that were taking place that evening. By the end of this sparsely-attended event, most of the ten audience members probably agreed with him.
But on a positive note, only one person walked out in the middle. In the interest of accuracy, I can’t count the poet who sat next to me and who said she found the program dull among the determined stayers because she was on crutches and could hardly skip out unobtrusively.
Lloyd-Jones runs KGB’s Liar’s League reading series, which is one of these readings series that employ actors to read or perform selected stories. He is a member of the book festival’s Bookends Committee.
His guests were Suzanne Dottino, who until recently ran KGB’s Sunday Night Fiction series. She said she’s still going to involved in some parts of it, although the bar has named a new curator. (see previous post).
The other Manhattan-based readings director was Katie Rainey of the Dead Rabbits series on the upper Upper East Side. Repping the city’s primary literary borough, Brooklyn, were Rachel Lyon of the Ditmas Lit series and Raquel Penzo, who runs the New Voices readings in Crown Heights.
The format consisted of Lloyd-Jones asking a series of perfectly appropriate questions and the readings directors responding. Rainey said that you should have at least one partner. Dottino said that she’d run her readings for as long as she had because, at least until recently, she felt that she was getting satisfaction from presenting the writers.
I was really impressed by the long-range planning that goes into running these readings, which in the case of Dead Rabbits and Ditmas Lit take place in bars. Indeed, Lyon said one necessary tool for her readings, which she runs with a partner, was her spreadsheet.
Penzo, who said she was handing off her curatorial duties soon, was the most amazingly organized of all the directors. She said she planned her events, had the printing of brochures set up and about a thousand other administrative details ironed out one year in advance. She also tries to suss out which of her scheduled readers for a given night might be able to pinch hit for her if she couldn’t make it.
Lloyd-Jones asked his guests what the worst thing that happened at one of their events was. Penzo said it was the writer who went on for 32 minutes, despite being told the limit was 15 minutes tops. Uptown at the Dead Rabbits reading, Rainey said that a couple breaking up loudly and close to the stage during somebody’s reading was a low point.
It’s always struck me that readings really are a form of improvisational theatre. I saw one writer breast-feed her child at the podium and another pass out. When you mix bars, or even bookstores, writers, booze and tight spaces, it’s no wonder the cops aren’t called in more often.
Other recommendations the directors noted were the importance of having the open mike section at the end and learning how to pronounce the names of the writers they’d be presenting. Although the second item seems self-evident, it generated the biggest laughs of session because Lloyd-Jones had mangled one of his guest’s names. The rationale for the first recommendation was that you don’t want the open mike readers and whatever friends they bring to leave as soon as their bit is over.
Beyond the interesting, but rather nuts and bolts aspects of running readings that Lloyd-Jones led his guests through, Penzo’s take on what she tries to accomplish at “Other Voices” stood out. She said she sees her role as giving other writers access to the kind of opportunities she has had. In particular, having paid $50,000 for an MFA from Fairleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey, she said she tries to share what she learned there with many of her writers who don’t have access to the benefits of getting a MFA.
One topic that didn’t come up was the role of readings blogs in what, for all its informality, can be described as the author event section of the publishing industry. The English Kills Review, a blog run by Ian MacAllen, is an excellent source of information about NYC readings. MacAllen also runs the Notable in New York readings listings in the Rumpus. That section is a must-read for the avid readings attendee. It’s not comprehensive and it tends to be Brooklyn-centric, but it’s one place to find out where the cool kids will be hanging.
Another good source I use is the Club Free Time listings, for some reason if you put 100 free poetry readings in New York into your browser, this site comes up. It’s fun because they list the author events, but they don’t say where they are. You’re supposed to pay a fee to get that information, but it is simple enough once you know the event exists to just find the address elsewhere.
Another site I use is Thought Gallery, which lists a lot of events that don’t turn up on MacAllen’s sites or Club Free Time.
A special shout out goes to Unnamable Books in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, which has great readings and I think a punk rock ethos about listings, i.e., they can’t be bothered.
The thing about all these scattered readings listings is that none of them are comprehensive. Maybe the super-organized Penzo could tackle this project when she retires from running her reading series.
I’ve always thought that never mind just listings, some kind of literary mafia, like the Brooklyn Literary Council, the parent organization of the Brooklyn Book Festival, or Lit Hub or Electric Literature, should do a roll-up of all the city’s reading venues. I’d like to see them walk into a bookstore like Books are Magic and say to its gifted events director, Michael, “That’s a nice podium you got there. Be a shame if anything happened to it.”
Lloyd-Jones didn’t take any questions from the audience, but if he had, I wanted to ask about what I think is the cardinal sin of readings directors, which is reading your own work.
Nearly all readings directors are writers and they get into the field to promote their own work, but as my writing teacher, the novelist Nelly Reifler told me before my short foray into MC’ing, “Don’t read your own work. People will invite you to read at their events and that’s how you do it.” Attendees of other Bookend Events would have stumbled upon this faux pas the night before Lloyd-Jones’ event.
So, while “How Not to Run A Reading Series” wasn’t a total success, organizers of the Brooklyn Book Festival can take comfort from the fact that only one able bodied person and not a single poet on crutches left in the middle.
