LitPDX seeks to amplify marginalized voices, and welcomes all, their ideas, their events, and their words.

For details regarding specific events please contact the organizers or venues. If you are an organizer or venue and would like to reach out to us please feel free to contact us or submit an event using our submission form. We’d love to hear from you!

April Poetry Practice Space

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Join us monthly on zoom, on the third Thursday of the month for prompts and sharing. Register here, and we’ll send the zoom link on the day of the event. Poetry Practice Space is a monthly gathering for poets and writers. Writing materials, readings and prompts for generative writing will be provided. Come share a space to talk about your writing practice, and current writing projects, bemoan rejections, celebrate acceptances, share writing resources— and write together! Consider Poetry Practice Space the calisthenics for your poetics. Suggested donation, no one turned away for lack of funds Free for members

Free

PNCA MFA Reading: Ocean Vuong in conversation with Dao Strom

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Mark your calendars!!! On Thursday, April 15th at 6:30 p.m., poet and novelist Ocean Vuong will read from his recent creative works. Following the reading, Vuong will be joined by faculty mentor and interdisciplinary artist Dao Strom for a conversation. This event will be co-hosted by PNCA’s MFA Low-Residency Creative Writing and MA Critical Studies programs and has been made possible by a generous grant from the Collins Foundation. Ocean Vuong is the author of The New York Times bestselling novel, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, from Penguin Press (2019) and forthcoming in 30 languages. A recipient of a 2019 MacArthur “Genius” Grant, Vuong is also the author of the critically acclaimed poetry collection, Night Sky with Exit Wounds, a New York Times Top 10…

Free

Slamlandia

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Slamlandia is a poetry open mic and slam that meets every month. This mic provides a creative, fun, and welcoming space for all literary communities in Portland. We encourage poets new and old to come share their work. We strive towards a safer space for poets to read their own poetry, witness others, and participate in community. Hosted by Julia Gaskill. Register in advance for this event If you have any questions, please contact slamlandia@gmail.com or jessica@literary-arts.org.

Free

The Writers’ Gymnasium: The Writing Workout

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

How can we build a better writing practice? This prompt-driven generative workshop will give writers an opportunity to flex their literary muscles. Classes will provide an intimate, structured, and supportive time to broaden basic and complex writing skills. Through a series of experimental and innovative exercises we will explore the concepts of character, setting, plot and scene, as well as voice, form, and technique. Close attention will be paid to literary and poetic devices as we take a deep dive into the craft of prose writing. Supportive in-workshop sharing and feedback will be an integral part of the process. All genres welcome. Access Program We want our writing classes to be accessible to everyone, regardless of income and background. We understand that our tuition structure…

$285

April BIPOC writer workshop

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

For BIPOC writers Searching for a space to create new work with fellow BIPOC writers? This two-hour workshop meets on Zoom. A variety of prompts will be presented as avenues for generating and sharing new work in an informal setting. Open to BIPOC writers at all levels writing in poetry, fiction, or nonfiction. Scholarships are available. Contact Susan Moore at susan@literary-arts.org for more information. Jacqueline Fitzgerald is an educator, coach, and writer who strives to lead through a love ethic and believes in the power of stories to change hearts and minds. Her writing has been published in the Oregonian, The Learning Network of the New York Times, and Beacon Magazine. Currently, she is working on a speculative future novel exploring intergenerational experiences of survival…

$15

Talakayan at Kapehan: The Power of the Written Word

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Please join us for our next event in the Talakayan at Kapehan Series: The Power of the Written Word, cosponsored by NAFCON Portland and Whitenoise Project! Did you know Clark County, WA, has a Filipino American Poet Laureate? What is the tradition of our poets making art and building community in the Philippines and the diaspora, and why weren’t we taught about them in schools? Join NAFCON Oregon and Whitenoise Project as we celebrate National Poetry Month, exploring these questions with local writers Armin Tolentino and Abigail Licad. Our second #NAFCONTAK event of 2021 will feature a poetry reading and discussion about seizing the means of literary production and building alternate structures to the academy. There will be a community Q&A after the reading, all…

Free

Kim Stafford and John Morrison, A Virtual Event

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

A Zoom Poetry Evening with Kim Stafford and John Morrison Please join us for an evening of poetry, music, and possibly even a little film, as we welcome Portland poets Kim Stafford and John Morrison to the Broadway Books virtual stage on Monday, April 19th, at 4:30 Pacific Time. It's National Poetry month, and we're going to have some poetic fun to celebrate! This evening is a red night, as Kim's book is published by Red Hen Press and John's is published by Redbat  Books. In Singer Come from Afar, Stafford considers war and peace, pandemic struggles, Earth imperatives, a seeker's spirit, and forging kinship. The former poet laureate of Oregon, Stafford offers tools for connection with the self, the community, and the Earth. Kathleen…

Free

Attic Institute: SPRING Online: Seeing the Story with Fresh Eyes: Revision Workshop w Thea Chacamaty

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Two-hour Seminar: Have you finished a draft of a short story, essay, poem, or novel and are now ready to enter the next phase--the arduous, maddening, and fun process of revision? This two-hour seminar will help you see your work with fresh eyes. To revise in Latin means to “re-see” or to “see again.” Using targeted writing exercises to summon the heart of our writing, we will learn new revision techniques that make the writing new again. Register for this workshop NOTE: To protect everyone during the COVID-19 pandemic, we're offering our workshops via Zoom. All students must first sign up for a free Zoom account. Setting it up is easy. And we can help you with questions, if needed. For each class, you'll receive a Zoom "invitation," from the…

$45 – $64

Attic Institute: SPRING Online: Ekphrastic Poetry Workshop w Ruben Quesada

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

It Came from Outer Space: This class will focus on writing new poetry. In this workshop we will challenge our notions of ekphrasis by focusing our attention on sci-fi films to generate our poems. While the Greek term ekphrasis translates simply as ‘a vivid description’ of a thing, the long-established tradition of ekphrastic poetry opens the door to a wide range of creative approaches for poets to engage with a work of art in another medium. Ekphrastic poems utilize a myriad of forms and strategies, and they respond to, incorporate, investigate, embellish, interpret and/or reflect upon a vital work of art—usually either a painting, photograph, or sculpture. You will be expected to view one or more of the films from the list below as the source of artwork.…

$215 – $242

2020/21 Portland Arts & Lectures: Joy Harjo

Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall 1037 SW Broadway, Portland, OR, United States

Joy Harjo is a renowned performer and writer of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation and was named the 23rd Poet Laureate of the United States in 2019. Harjo is the author of nine books of poetry—most recently An American Sunrise—several plays and children’s books, and a memoir, Crazy Brave. She has received numerous prominent awards, including the 2017 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize and 2015 Wallace Stevens Award. The Librarian of Congress, Carla Hayden, says: “Her work powerfully connects us to the earth and the spiritual world with direct, inventive lyricism that helps us reimagine who we are.” Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Harjo earned her MFA at the Iowa Writ­ers’ Work­shop and has taught Eng­lish, Cre­ative Writ­ing, and Amer­i­can Indi­an Stud­ies at numerous universities, while per­form­ing music and poet­ry…

$90 – $355