Currently viewing the tag: "Poetry Slam"

Take This Job and Slam It!

By On February 2, 2011 · 26 Comments · In Personal

All good things do eventually come to an end, and for me, on the heels of an amazingly successful DBW11, I realized I was coming upon a crucial fork in the road, and while the DBW path will surely continue to be an exciting one for those continuing on, it’s one I realized would ultimately take me away from my true passion: Books, Authors, Readers and the myriad connections still to be made between them.

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Burning Down the House: True Story

By On October 22, 2009 · 12 Comments · In Personal, Publishing

The only thing I was fit for was to be a writer, and this notion rested solely on my suspicion that I would never be fit for real work, and that writing didn’t require any.

–Russell Baker

I’ve been “a writer” since the 5th grade, when the combination of praise I received for a plagiarized [...]

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Ignoring No

By On October 11, 2009 · 5 Comments · In Publishing

[This is a guest post by Tara Betts. Her info is at the end of the post.]

come celebrate
with me that everyday
something has tried to kill me
and has failed.

— from Lucille Clifton’s Book of Light (Copper Canyon Press, 1993)

I kept notebooks as a [...]

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Three Rules for the National Poetry Slam

By On July 15, 2009 · 4 Comments · In Personal

Eleven years ago next month, in Austin, TX, I took one of the most life-changing thrill rides ever when I attended my first National Poetry Slam, as a member of the 1998 team representing the Nuyorican Poets Café that would go on to become their first (and still only) team to win the [...]

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What New Media Can Learn From Slam Poetry

By On May 11, 2009 · 10 Comments · In Marketing, Writing

“I have just read the immortal poems of the ages and come away dull. I don’t know who’s at fault; maybe it’s the weather, but I sense a lot of pretense and poesy footwork: I am writing a poem, they seem to say, look at me! Poetry must be forgotten; we must [...]

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