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

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Joshua Jay in Conversation With Joe Posnanski

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

The door to magic is closed, but it’s not locked. And now Joshua Jay, one of the world’s most accomplished magicians, not only opens that door but brings us inside to reveal the artistry and obsessiveness, esoteric history, and long-whispered-about traditions of a subject shrouded in mystery. And he goes one step further: Jay brings us right into the mind of a magician — how they develop their otherworldly skills, conjure up illusions, and leave the rest of us slack-jawed with delight time after time. Along the way, Jay reveals another kind of secret, one all readers will find meaningful even if they never aspire to perform sleight of hand: What does it take to follow your heart and achieve excellence? In 52 short, compulsively…

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Free

Livestream Reading: Teresa K. Miller and Amanda Moore

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Annie Bloom's welcomes Portland poet Teresa K. Miller for a reading from her new collection, Borderline Fortune. Teresa will be joined by San Francisco poet Amanda Moore, whose debut collection is Requeening. Both are winners of the National Poetry Series. Please register in advance for this Zoom event: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZIpdeCprj4sEtMYXfEafxU_5tXVJ1XiPh0v If you would like signed or personalized copies of either book (or both), please leave a note in the comments section of your order! About Borderline Fortune: Borderline Fortune is a meditation on intangible family inheritance—of unresolved intergenerational conflicts and traumas in particular—set against the backdrop of our planetary inheritance as humans. As species go extinct and glaciers melt, Teresa K. Miller asks what we owe one another and what it means to echo one's ancestors’…

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Free

Call and Response: The Story of Black Lives Matter Virtual Discussion

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

When you think “call and response,” you may think of protest chants like “Whose streets?” “Our streets!”— groups of voices joining together to form a powerful rallying cry. Call and Response: The Story of Black Lives Matter, published by Versify/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt on August 17, is an essential history of Black Lives Matter centered on those voices, beginning with the movement's founders Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi. Author Veronica Chambers of The New York Times documents the pivotal moments that galvanized Black Lives Matter, featuring stories and quotes from the activists that built upon a vision to stand up for racial justice. Nearly 100 striking New York Times photographs accompany the text, setting Call and Response apart as a visual narrative of the…

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Free

Sallie Tisdale in Conversation With Bernard Cooper

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Sallie Tisdale, author of the acclaimed Advice for Future Corpses (and Those Who Love Them) brings “her singular sensibility, her genius for language, her love of our deeply imperfect world” (Karen Karbo) to The Lie About the Truck: Survivor, Reality TV, and the Endless Gaze (Gallery), an insightful exploration of reality TV and the shifting definitions of truth in America. What is the truth? In a world of fake news and rampant conspiracy theories, the nature of truth has increasingly blurry borders. In her clever and timely cultural commentary, Tisdale tackles this issue by framing it in a familiar way — reality TV, particularly the long-running CBS show Survivor. With humor and in-depth superfan analysis, Tisdale explores the distinction between suspended disbelief and true authenticity,…

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Free

Science Fiction Book Club (REMOTE)

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Join us Tuesday October 19th at 6:30pm for our Science Fiction Book Club. We will discuss Light from Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki. About the Book: Good Omens meets The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet in Ryka Aoki's Light From Uncommon Stars, a defiantly joyful adventure set in California's San Gabriel Valley, with cursed violins, Faustian bargains, and queer alien courtship over fresh-made donuts.   Shizuka Satomi made a deal with the devil: to escape damnation, she must entice seven other violin prodigies to trade their souls for success. She has already delivered six.   When Katrina Nguyen, a young transgender runaway, catches Shizuka's ear with her wild talent, Shizuka can almost feel the curse lifting. She's found her final candidate.   But in a donut shop…

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$25.99

Premise Course: Do we have the ability to make ourselves free? de Beauvoir’s The Ethics of Ambiguity & Kafka’s The Metamorphosis

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

(Learn about Premise classes here: https://www.premiseinstitute.com/premisefaq) In her book The Ethics of Ambiguity, the philosopher Simone de Beauvoir asks us to consider what it means to exercise individual freedom and to live in community with others. Where does our individual freedom begin and end? Simone de Beauvoir wrote The Ethics of Ambiguity in 1947, in the wake of Nazi atrocities and totalitarianism. She questions and seeks to define personal ethics and freedom and claims that such freedom can be manifest only when we “will others free.” How do we create a life where we protect our individual freedom and work toward the freedom of our neighbor? Can both forms of freedom truly exist? At first glance, Franz Kafka may seem an odd pairing with Simone…

Continue readingPremise Course: Do we have the ability to make ourselves free? de Beauvoir’s The Ethics of Ambiguity & Kafka’s The Metamorphosis
$150

HOCUS Live Reading: TALISMANS

Rose City Book Pub 1329 NE Fremont, Portland, OR, United States

Join Portland's best-publicized literary secret society for an evening of community, prose and poetry, and arcane rituals. This event is BYOT.* *Bring Your Own Talisman.

Free

Dr. Jane Goodall in Conversation With Dr. Evan Antin / Ticketed Event

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Join us for a special event with Dr. Jane Goodall DBE, global icon and the world's most famous living naturalist, as she discusses her new book, The Book of Hope: A Survival Guide for Trying Times (Celadon). Dr. Goodall will be joined in conversation by celebrity wildlife veterinarian, Dr. Evan Antin, author of World Wild Vet: Encounters in the Animal Kingdom. The two will discuss one of the most sought after and least understood elements of human nature: hope. Drawing on decades of work that has helped expand our understanding of what it means to be human and what we all need to do to help build a better world, Jane will touch on vital questions, including: How do we stay hopeful when everything seems…

Continue readingDr. Jane Goodall in Conversation With Dr. Evan Antin / Ticketed Event
$28

Kia Corthron in Conversation With Robin D. G. Kelley

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

An exploration of NYC and America in the burgeoning moments before the start of the Civil War through the eyes of a young, biracial girl, Moon and the Mars (Seven Stories) is the highly anticipated new novel from Kia Corthron, winner of the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize. Set in the impoverished Five Points district of New York City in the years 1857-1863, we experience neighborhood life through the eyes of Theo from childhood to adolescence, an orphan living between the homes of her Black and Irish grandmothers. Throughout her formative years, Theo witnesses everything from the creation of tap dance to P. T. Barnum’s sensationalist museum to the draft riots that tear NYC asunder, amidst the daily maelstrom of Five Points work, hardship,…

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Free

Pre-Show Discussion: Emily Rapp Black in Conversation with Vanessa Severo

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Join us online for this conversation between Emily Rapp Black, The New York Times bestselling author of Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg, and Vanessa Severo, actor/playwright of Frida ... A Self Portrait. Both artists will discuss how the life, art, and disabilities of Frida Kahlo have impacted their work. This event will be streamed online at YouTube, Facebook, and Twitch. About Emily Rapp Black Emily Rapp Black is the author of Poster Child: A Memoir (BloomsburyUSA) and The Still Point of the Turning World (Penguin Press), a New York Times bestseller and an Editor’s Pick. A former Fulbright scholar, she was educated at Harvard University, Trinity College-Dublin, Saint Olaf College, and the University of Texas-Austin, where she was a James A. Michener Fellow. A Guggenheim Fellow, she has received awards and fellowships from the Rona Jaffe Foundation, the Jentel…

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Free
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