Reading Local Seattle

POETRY PERFORMANCE: Charles Bernstein and the Attack of the Difficult Poems

Charles Bernstein takes us deep into the world of his new work in a command performance—trailing commentary, thought, poetry.

Born in 1950 in New York City, Bernstein is the author of over forty books of poetry and poetics, and is a key figure in the Language Poetry movement started in the 1970’s. The Donald T. Regan Professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania, Bernstein is famous for his brilliant avant garde work in diverse sites—in texts, in the university, on the internet, and on the streets.

Forthcoming in spring in 2010 is All the Whiskey in Heaven: Selected Poems (Farrar, Straus and Giroux). Other titles include Girly Man (University of Chicago Press, 2006); My Way: Speeches and Poems (University of Chicago Press, 1999); Content’s Dream (Sun & Moon, 1986); Islets / Irritations (Jordan Davies, 1983). Bernstein is an elected Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and has received numerous awards, including a Guggenheim and a NEA.

Among Bernstein’s many poetry projects are his co-founding of the Poetics (Ph.D.) Program and the Electronic Poetry Center at SUNY, Buffalo; his co-editorship of the Modern and Contemporary Poetics series at the University of Alabama Press; his hosting of multiple LINEbreak and Close Listening poetry interviews; and his development of the internet audio poetry archive, PENNSound.